PHEOCHROMOCYTOMA, an epinephrine- and arterenol-producing tumor, has now become recognizable and is safely removable by surgery. Graham1 estimates that in the United States more than 800 patients die annually of this disease, and many of these are avoidable deaths. More of these lesions are being reported as removed surgically before irreversible circulatory changes have occurred. This report is based on the experience of a successfully operated extra-adrenal tumor located in the left retroperitoneal para-aortic region.
NATURE OF THE TUMOR
This tumor has at times been called a chromaffinoma, since it arises from the cells in the chromaffin system but is known better by the term pheochromocytoma—pheo, of Greek derivation, meaning dark; chromo, from the Greek, significant of color staining dark with chrome salts; and cytoma, from the Greek, denoting cell and cell tumor. This tumor is found throughout the chromaffin system distribution; in the medulla of the adrenal