[Liver neoplasms in children].

Presentation is made of 27 cases of liver neoplasms in infancy and childhood that were admitted to the Pediatric Hospital of the National Medical Center of the IMSS, through a period of 15 years. Sixteen cases were diagnosed as hepatoblastoma, 2 as hepatocellular carcinoma, 4 as mesenchymal hamartoma, 2 as hemangioendothelioma of infantile type, 2 were embryonal rhabdomyosarcoma of the intrahepatic bile-ducts and one case of multiple bile-ducts hamartoma. The hepatoblastoma and the mesenchymal hamartoma are neoplasms that appear more frequently before the age of 2 years; the hepatocellular carcinoma, after 5 years of age and the infantile hemangioendothelioma generally appears before 6 months old. In all, benign and malignant cases, the clinical manifestations were non specific and did not help to establish the diagnoses. The mesenchymal hamartomas were characterized by the fast growth that led to think in neoplasms of malignant nature. The selective treatment is lobectomy with a better prognosis if the neoplasm is located in the left lobe. The right lobe was the most frequently affected by the benign tumors, as well as by the malignant, and the lung was the organ wherein metastases more often were found.