Uncommon metastatic site of renal adenocarcinoma: The oral tongue

Primary tumours metastasizing to the tongue are very unusual and only anecdotal cases have been reported. An exhaustive literature review covering the period from 1970 onwards disclosed only 22 cases of renal adenocarcinoma metastasizing to the tongue. We report the case of an 87-year-old female patient with oral tongue, lung, liver, thyroid gland, pancreas and renal adenocarcinoma metastases. She had undergone contralateral nephrectomy for clear cell carcinoma 10 years before diagnosis of the metastases. The tongue lesion was surgically removed under local anaesthesia. Tongue metastasis of renal adenocarcinoma is usually a manifestation of widespread disease. The prognosis for patients with lingual metastasis of renal adenocarcinoma is poor, the mean interval from diagnosis of tongue metastasis to death being 5.8 months. In our patient, metastatic involvement of the tongue was detected ≈5 months before death. Treatment of renal adenocarcinoma metastasis to the tongue is usually palliative and aims to pro...