What kind of cancer can you have from a soft tissue mass/tumor in the knee besides Sarcoma?

They found a 3cm soft tissue mass in the posterior of my knee almost 2 weeks ago. It is eroding the lateral side of my medial femoral condyle and they think it has torn my PCL. I was referrred to an orthopedic onocologist b/c they couldn't determine if it was cancerous by MRI, CAT scan, or Bone Scan I have had done. And my local orthopedic surgeon I have been seeing doesnt feel comfortable doing the biopsy b/c it is so 'aggressive'. And my ortho onocologist said its going to be a very "involved" surgery b/c it is so close to the major artery in my leg and other factors. But all 3 doctors I have been to have mentioned that it could be cancer but the only type that has been mentioned that I can remember was Sarcoma. Is there any other cancer that could be in the knee?

Your cancer is not located in the knee joint or it would most likely be a bone tumor called an osteosarcoma. Since your tumor is instead located in the soft tissue that surrounds your knee one possibility would be a leiomyosarcoma which is a type of rare soft tissue sarcoma. Here is a basic web page on leiomyosarcoma

http://www.leiomyosarcoma.info/

Leiomyosarcoma is a rare and difficult to treat type of sarcoma.

I have a couple of suggestions for you. At all of your next Dr appts. either take real good notes or even better take someone else that you trust with you to take notes for you and to also listen. Ask the Drs to spell any words or terms with which you are not familiar.
My second suggestion would be not to spend a lot of time doing the "what if" game until you know exactly what type of tumor you are dealing with. Wasting your time with speculation will just cause you mental grief and lack of sleep for no good purpose. Don't read too much until you know what you actually need to read about or you will just scare yourself needlessly.

The web page below will give you a list of all the various benign and malignant soft tissue tumors. Until you have the pathology report back from your biopsy any guessing as to what type of tumor you have will be speculation so concentrate on keeping your spirits up and getting organized. You have at least one major surgery in your near future so you need to concentrate on the things you know and can control and not spend time worrying trouble until trouble worries you.

http://www.emedicine.com/orthoped/topic3...

I would get a referral to a teaching hospital or major cancer center for surgery by an expert orthopedic surgeon who works exclusively with tumors located in or near joints. This will give you much better odds on maintaining good knee function after the surgery than if your surgeon is less experienced and just doing the best job he can.

good luck

If you are dealing with a sarcoma you should immediately request a sarcoma specialist. These are rare tumors and not many doctors including oncologists have seen them. You also need to be diagnosed in order to be treated. Make an appointment to see a sarcoma specialist as soons as possible. At least if it is sarcoma than they will know how to treat it.

Visit the Sarcoma Alliance for more information on how to locate a Sarcoma center and specialist:
http://www.sarcomaalliance.com/master.ht...

Good luck.