Successful management of hemopericardium and cardiac tamponade secondary to occult malignancy and anticoagulation.

In patients presenting with pericarditis or pericardial effusion without known malignancy, the likelihood of finding previously undiagnosed cancer in different publications typically ranges from 4% to 7%. Cardiac tamponade due to malignant pericardial effusion is thus a rare clinical entity and often acutely life threatening. The present report describes an unusual case of large pericardial bleeding causing tamponade in the setting of fondaparinux anticoagulation, heterozygous factor V Leiden mutation and eventual discovery of meta-static adenocarcinoma.