Diffuse schwannoma involving the entire large bowel with huge extramural development: report of a case.
Schwannoma of the large bowel is a rare clinical entity, which has reportedly been recognized to arise from one place with a submucosal tumor morphology. We present herein the unique case of a 25-year-old woman who suffered from a schwannoma diffusely involving the entire large intestine. The patient complained of abdominal distension and imaging studies revealed a giant tumor occupying the whole abdomen, but no confirmed preoperative diagnosis could be made. A laparotomy proved the huge tumor detected preoperatively to be the markedly wall-thickened entire large bowel itself due to the diffuse extramural development of a neoplasm, but no other organs were involved. Biopsy specimens from the tumor were histologically diagnosed as benign schwannoma. However, because of the possibility of malignancy, we later performed a total proctocolectomy followed by an ileal J-pouch-anal canal anastomosis. The final pathological diagnosis was also that of a benign schwannoma originating from the large intestine. The patient remains well without recurrence 15 months after surgery. To the best of our knowledge, no such case of a schwannoma in the entire large bowel has yet been reported in the literature, and the pathogenesis of its occurrence remains unknown.
Nabeya
Y
Y
Department of Surgery, Funabashi Municipal Medical Center, Chiba, Japan.
Watanabe
Y
Y
Tohnosu
N
N
Yamazaki
M
M
Matsuda
M
M
Akutsu
N
N
Kono
T
T
Sato
H
H
Uehara
T
T
D000328:Adult; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007414:Intestinal Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology* / Q000601:surgery; D007420:Intestine, Large / Q000473:pathology* / Q000601:surgery; D009442:Neurilemmoma / Q000473:pathology* / Q000601:surgery; D016737:Proctocolectomy, Restorative / Q000379:methods*