[Cholesterol Granuloma Arising in the Thymus:Report of a Case].

The patient was a 64-year-old man who was found to have an abnormal shadow in the anterior mediastinum on a chest computed tomography( CT) scan during a health check. He was admitted for diagnosis and treatment, and underwent thoracoscopic thymic and thymic tumor removal. The postoperative course was uneventful, and the patient was discharged on the 4th postoperative day. Histopathological examination revealed numerous foreign body giant cells and cholesterol crystals in the thymus tissue, and the patient was diagnosed with cholesterol granuloma. One cause of cholesterol granuloma is trauma. Trauma was suspected as the cause in this case because the patient had bruised his chest in a traffic accident eight years ago. It is difficult to diagnose cholesterol granuloma from image findings, and surgical resection is necessary for diagnosis and treatment to differentiate it from malignant diseases.