Two Cases of Unusual Infectious Peritonitis Mimicking Peritoneal Carcinomatosis of Early Gastric Cancer / 대한소화기내시경학회지

ABSTRACT

Endoscopic mucosal resection is an organ-saving and minimally invasive treatment modality for early gastric cancer that is mucosa-confined, differentiated, and less than 2 cm in size. On pre-treatment cancer staging work-ups, unusual, benign, infiltrative peritoneal lesions can mimic metastasis of early gastric cancer, and thus lead to loss of an opportunity for the lesion to be properly treated by endoscopy. In the present cases, we report two unusual cases of infectious peritonitis, i.e., tuberculosis and paragonimiasis, which have been occurring sporadically in Korea. The two infectious lesions were confirmed by peritoneal biopsy and the gastric cancers were subsequently removed by endoscopic mucosectomy. These two cases remind us of 1) following indications for endoscopic mucosectomy, 2) the need for peritoneal biopsy for undetermined peritoneal lesions while avoiding laparoscopic gastrectomy, and 3) the coincidental occurrence of unusual infectious peritonitis with gastric cancer in our geographic region.