A CASE OF NON-SURGICAL PNEUMOPERITONIUM: GAS UNDER THE DIAPHRAGM

Authors

  • Quratulain Fatima Masood
  • Tahawar Khaleeq
  • Quratulain Khan
  • Saba Abbasi
  • Sameen Arshad
  • Farah Bano
  • Danish Pervaiz

Abstract

A 58-year-old woman presented with an unexpected episode of vomiting and an acute abdomen.The patient mentioned a vague history of decreased appetite dyspepsia and constipation.Abdominal X-Ray revealed gas under diaphragm. An Open laparotomy was carried out toevacuate the free gas trapped under the diaphragm. The condition is almost always associated withperforation of abdominal viscera and accumulation of air during surgical or gynaecologicalprocedures or peritoneal dialysis. In the reported case, laparotomy revealed no sign of perforationin GIT, uterine fundus or fistulas and nor did the have patient have any history of surgical orgynaecological procedures. This lead to suggestion of spontaneous or non-surgicalpneumoperitonium which is extremely rare. Extensive investigations revealed no known causepneumoperitonium making our case rare and unique.Keywords: pneumoperitonium; non-surgical pneumoperitonium, diaphragm, pneumoperitonei

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Published

2009-06-01