Superior vena cava syndrome as tumour presentation [Síndroma da veia cava superior como apresentação de neoplasia]

Superior vena cava syndrome (svcs) is characterised by gradual and insidious compression/obstruction of the superior vena cava (svc). upper chest and neck ingurgitation,plethoric face and oedema are the common symptoms/signs. it generally means the presence of neoplasm,namely lung cancer. aim: retrospective analysis of the patients admitted to s. joão hospital,porto,portugal,january 1995-december 2006 with svcs without previous diagnosis. patients,tumour characteristics and prognostic factors were studied. material and methods: data was collected by consulting the clinical files of 60 svcs patients without previous diagnosis. data was gathered on the patients' demographic characteristics (age,gender,smoking habits),performance status,histology,staging,treatment and overall survival. results: lung cancer was observed in 87% of the patients. small-cell lung cancer (sclc) was the most frequent histological type; 41% of the patients. it is noticeable that 10% were diagnosed with non-hodgkin's lymphoma. in terms of prognostic factors analysed,the absence of metastasis,the lymphoma's histological diagnosis,good performance status and non-smoker status were positively correlated with the survival rate. on the contrary sclc was significantly correlated with a worse survival. conclusions: in our analysis we concluded that sclc,smokers and a poorer performance status as well as metastatic disease were unfavourable prognostic factors to svcs as tumour presentation.