title: Atraumatic splenic rupture: an atypical presentation in a previously healthy patient.
abstract: Atraumatic splenic rupture represents a life-threatening abdominal event that requires immediate diagnosis and prompt surgical treatment to ensure the survival of the patient. Atraumatic rupture is relatively uncommon and can occur either in pathological spleens or, more rarely, in normal ones. It has a high morbidity, frequently with few and non specific signs suggesting its presence, can be associated to other pathologies incidentally discovered by imaging. We present a case, successfully treated, of a 51-year-old man, previously healthy, that referred to our hospital for arterial hypertension and abdominal pain; the patient, for an idiopathic splenic rupture with haemoperitoneum, underwent an open splenectomy whose histology examination showed a normal spleen.
  
  
  BACKGROUND
  Atraumatic splenic rupture, Normal spleen, Spontaneos haemoperitoneum - Full text is available at: www.annaliitalianidichirurgia.it.
authors.forename: Fausto
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Fama'
authors.forename: Giovanni
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Scibilia
authors.forename: Antonio
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Ieni
authors.forename: Dario Lo
authors.initials: DL
authors.lastname: Presti
authors.forename: Alessandra
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Villari
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Gioffrè Florio
mesh_terms: D006465:Hemoperitoneum / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000209:etiology / Q000601:surgery*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012422:Rupture, Spontaneous; D013156:Splenectomy; D013161:Splenic Rupture / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000601:surgery*; D016896:Treatment Outcome