When he reflects on the first time he witnessed and had to treat a cardiac tumour, Dr. Robert James (RJ) Cusimano rifles through his memory bank.
“It was a long time ago,” he says, estimating that time frame to be well over 20 years. “It has been an evolution in cardiac surgery.”
Considered a “rare” medical occurrence, these abnormal growths either develop in the heart or heart valves (primary tumour), or spread to the heart from another part of the body (secondary tumour), already afflicted with cancer…