The incidence of metastatic bony lesion has been increased recently, with the advanced therapeutic modalities of malignant tumors. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of surgical treatment in impending or established pathologic fractures due to metastasis in extremity. From 1981 to 1992, thirty two patients who had established or impending pathologic fractures in extremity had been treated surgically. The locations of metastasis, were lower extremity in 24 cases(femsral head and neck;5, intertrochanteric;7, subtrochanteric;8, femoral shaft;4) and upper extremity in 8 cases(proximal humerus;2, humoral shaft;6). The method of surgery was excision of tumor mass and rigid internal fixation to allow immediate mobilization, except 2 cases of amputation. The results were analysed by two criteria. The first was the grade of performance status that was made by modification of Functional Classification of New York Heart Association. The second was the degree of pain relief. The performance status was improved at least one grade in all patients and the mean improvement was 1.7 grades. The satisfactory pain relief was achieved in 81% of patients. Postoperatively, most of the patients had only slight to moderate limitation of physical activities and they became comfortable at rest and ordinary activities. The solitary metastatic lesions showed better pain relief(92%) than multiple metastasis(75%). The curative surgery was done in 3 cases, and they showed more than 24 months of disease-free survival.