Pulmonary blastoma

Lung tumor
Other malignancies
Pulmonary blastoma

Topic Completed: 1 September 2012

Revised: 8 April 2019

Revised: 31 January 2019, last major update September 2012

Copyright: (c) 2003-2017, PathologyOutlines.com, Inc.

PubMed Search: pulmonary blastoma

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Cite this page: Jain D. Pulmonary blastoma. PathologyOutlines.com website. http://www.pathologyoutlines.com/topic/lungtumorpulmonaryblastoma.html. Accessed June 20th, 2019.

Definition / general

Rare tumor composed of mixture of immature epithelial and mesenchymal tissue resembling fetal lung tissue
Also called embryoma
Usually adults (mean age 43 years), 20% occur in patients < age 20 years
Metastases common
2 / 3 die within 2 years
See also pleuropulmonary blastoma - cystic tumor of pleura and lung

Case reports

16 year old boy with biphasic tumor (Arch Pathol Lab Med 2002;126:875)
16 year old girl (Case Rep Med 2012;2012:471613)

Gross description

Peripheral, solitary, well circumscribed, large

Microscopic (histologic) description

Biphasic tumor in which epithelial and mesenchymal components have a primitive, "fetal-type" appearance
Well formed tubular glands surrounded by cellular stroma of "embryonal" appearance
Resembles Wilms' tumor and fetal lung at 10 - 16 weeks
Glandular cells are tall, columnar, often with clear cytoplasm and subnuclear and supranuclear cytoplasmic vacuoles
Morules with ground glass nuclei are common
Stroma may differentiate towards striated muscle, smooth muscle, cartilage
In infants / children, epithelial component is benign appearing or minimal

Microscopic (histologic) images

Images hosted on other servers:

Biphasic tumor

Positive stains

PAS (glycogen in epithelial cells)

Molecular / cytogenetics description

CTNNB1 mutation (J Clin Pathol 2011;64:349)