Excision of a large abdominal wall lipoma improved bowel passage in a Proteus syndrome patient.

Proteus syndrome is an extremely rare congenital disorder that produces multifocal overgrowth of tissue. This report presents a surgical case of a large lipoma in the abdominal wall of a patient with Proteus syndrome. She was diagnosed with Proteus syndrome based on certain diagnostic criteria. The neoplasm increased in size gradually, producing hemihypertrophy of her left lower extremity and trunk, and spread to her retroperitoneum and her left abdominal wall. She experienced gradually progressive constipation, nausea, vomiting, and abdominal pain. Computed tomography (CT) of the abdomen demonstrated a large mass in the subcutaneous adipose tissue of the left lower abdominal wall which measured 12 cm x 8 cm x 6 cm in diameter and encased the left colon. This mass in the abdominal wall was excised. The weight of the excised mass was 1550 g. The histopathological diagnosis of this mass was lipoma. After surgery, the encasement of the left colon was improved, and the patient was able to move her bowels twice per day. The excision of the large lipoma in the abdominal wall contributed to the improved bowel passage in this patient with Proteus syndrome.

The difference between intramural and arterial partial pressure of carbon dioxide increases significantly during laparoscopic cholecystectomy: the effect of thoracic epidural anesthesia.

UNLABELLED: We studied the effects of pneumoperitoneum on gastric submucosal perfusion metabolism during elective laparoscopic cholecystectomy (LASC) by measuring the PCO(2) gap, defined as the difference between intramucosal PCO(2) and arterial PCO(2), using gas tonometry in 20 patients. Furthermore, we examined whether thoracic epidural anesthesia (TEA) affects gastric submucosal perfusion metabolism during LASC. Patients were randomly allocated to receive general anesthesia (group G, n = 10) or general anesthesia combined with TEA (group E, n = 10). In both groups, the PCO(2) gap increased significantly during pneumoperitoneum and remained at this level until the end of surgery compared with the baseline value. There were no significant differences in PCO(2) gap values between the two groups at any time sampled. These results suggested that pneumoperitoneum significantly impaired gastric submucosal perfusion and metabolism and that TEA did not attenuate the impairment of gastric submucosal perfusion during or after pneumoperitoneum. IMPLICATIONS: We investigated the effect of pneumoperitoneum on gastric submucosal perfusion by measuring PCO(2) gap with the use of gas tonometry. PCO(2) gap significantly increased during and after the pneumoperitoneum compared with the control level. Thoracic epidural anesthesia did not attenuate this inhibition.