He reported no symptoms and no history of a clot anywhere in his body. The 60-year-old man had simply come in for his standard annual check, 14 years after a heart transplant, and the routine echocardiogram found giant masses sitting in his left atrium.
Doctors at John Paul II Hospital in Krakow, Poland, could not tell what they were looking at. Transesophageal imaging suggested either a clot or a cardiac tumor. Magnetic resonance imaging showed a left atrium measuring 8.7 by 10.6 centimeters, containing an irregular mass measuring 7 by 5 by 6.1 centimeters, anchored by a stalk to the back wall in the area of the graft suture lines. The radiologist favored a growth. He went to urgent surgery with a working diagnosis of tumor.
