No abstract

Spontaneous gastric intramural hematoma is a rare disease. Herein, we present a case of a previously healthy 28-year-old male patient who presented with diarrhea and diffuse abdominal pain of one-week duration. The patient was diagnosed with spontaneous gastric intramural hematoma post urgent partial gastrectomy for a bleeding gastric tumor. Six other cases of spontaneous gastric intramural hematoma are published in the literature; therefore, when encountering a case of intra-abdominal mass attached to the gastric wall, gastric intramural hematoma should be considered in the differential even when no cause is present.

Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the most common primary tumor of the liver. HCC usually develops in cirrhotic liver but cases arising in a healthy liver are rare and its etiology remains uncertain. The treatment of choice of hepatocellular carcinoma is surgical resection. Centrally located liver tumors were traditionally treated by extensive liver resection. With recent improvements in surgical techniques, centrally hepatectomy became an alternative approach for parenchymal preservation. We report here, the case of a 68-year-old male patient with an incidental finding of a 9 cm hepatic mass in segment IV of a non-cirrhotic liver found to be a hepatocellular carcinoma successfully treated by central hepatectomy. Although technically challenging, improvements in the understanding of liver structure, based on functional segmental anatomy, together with advances in imaging technology have contributed to the development of segment-oriented liver surgery making central hepatectomy an acceptable procedure for centrally located malignancies and allowing parenchyma preservation.

Isolated pneumomediastinum is a rare complication after laparoscopic procedures. Herein, we present a case of a 38-year-old woman who presented two days after laparoscopic cholecystectomy with pleuritic chest pain and dyspnea and was found to have isolated pneumomediastinum. The patient was admitted for monitoring, oxygen therapy, and antibiotic prophylaxis and she was discharged on the fourth postoperative day when her symptoms resolved both subjectively and radiologically. Only two other cases of symptomatic isolated pneumomediastinum after laparoscopic cholecystectomy were reported in the literature and all of them were female patients, diagnosed radiologically, and treated conservatively. Therefore, isolated pneumomediastinum should be included in the differential diagnosis of dyspnea and chest pain after laparoscopic surgeries in order to have an early diagnosis, start early treatment, and prevent unnecessary investigations or advancement of the disease.

The risk of developing appendiceal neuroendocrine tumor (aNET) may be attributed to multiple factors. A familial clustering is found in less than 1% of the cases. We report the case of a 25-year-old woman who initially presented with a clinical presentation of acute appendicitis and was subsequently diagnosed with aNET by histopathological examination after an emergency appendectomy. While revealing the result to the patient, she was found to have a positive family history of appendiceal carcinoid tumor. Although rare and only found in 1% of the cases, aNET found in family history should raise the suspicion of neuroendocrine tumors in other family members.