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Introduction: Primary cardiac tumors are uncommon, with prevalence of 0.0017%-0.19% at autopsy. Cardiac surgeons do not face these clinical issues very often in the irdailyactivity. In this study we presented our experience with a significant number of patients with cardiac tumor operated in our department. Material and methods: During 6 years, between 2000 and 2005, in the Department of Cardiac Surgery, Medical University of Lodz, 5.619 open heart operations were performed. In this group, there were 24 patients (9 men and 15 women, aged mean 56,9 ± 11,5 years) operated due to cardiac tumors, and those operations were 0,4% of all procedures. All the operations were performed using cardio-pulmonary bypass. The diagnostics of tumors was based mainly on echocardiography. All the patients older than 40years, underwent preoperative coronary angiography. Results: In 22 cases (91,7%) , the histopathological postoperative diagnosis was myxoma. In the remaining two cases the diagnosis was sarcoma and chondroma, respectively. In 22 (91,7%) patients, the tumor was localized in the left atrium and in2(8,3%) patients in the right atrium. In 21 cases the tumor was extirpated alone, in 2 patients it was excised together with a portion of atrial septum, and in one patient it was necessary to replace mitral valve. Additionally, two patients had simultaneous myocardial revascularization. There was no in-hospital mortality in this population. Conclusions: The most frequent localization for primary cardiac tumors is left atrium. The most prevalent primary cardiac tumor is myxoma. Clinical diagnosis of cardiac tumor is usually based on echocardiography. Precise diagnosis is possible not earlier than after postoperative histopathological examination. Surgical removal is the treatment of choice in primary cardiac tumors. (Clin. Exp. Med. Lett. 2006; 47(4):247-251)

Keywords: cardiac surgery, cardiac tumors, cardiac myxoma