Clinical presentation of cardiac myxoma in a Singapore national cardiac centre

INTRODUCTION: Cardiac myxoma is the most common cardiac tumour. In this study, we summarise our 17-year experience with the clinical presentation of cardiac myxoma at National Heart Centre Singapore, Singapore. METHODS: Between January 2000 and December 2016, retrospective data was reviewed for all consecutive patients who underwent surgical resection of cardiac myxoma. Patients' clinical characteristics were reviewed and described. RESULTS: A total of 67 (18 male, 49 female; mean age 53.1 ± 13.5 years) patients underwent cardiac myxoma resection. There were 19 (28.4%) patients with asymptomatic cardiac myxoma. There were no significant differences in gender; body habitus and myxoma size; and haemoglobin, white blood cell or platelet counts between patients with symptomatic and asymptomatic myxoma. However, the number of asymptomatic cardiac myxomas seemed to follow an increasing trend from 19.4% (period 2000-2008) to 36.1% (period 2009-2016), suggestive of an 'era effect'. CONCLUSION: In our study, a majority of patients were women, with a wide age range of 18-78 years. The diagnosis of asymptomatic cardiac myxoma was present in 28.4% of patients, with an increasing trend for incidence over the years. This is possibly due to increased opportunistic screening (with electrocardiography and clinical examination) as well as higher usage of medical imaging.