title: Sclerosing mesenteritis: a systematic review of 192 cases.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Sclerosing mesenteritis includes a spectrum of inflammatory disorders involving the adipose tissue of the bowel mesentery.
  
  
  OBJECTIVE
  To perform a systematic review of previously reported cases of sclerosing mesenteritis (SM) to determine the epidemiology, risk factors, methods of diagnosis, treatment patterns and outcomes for this disease.
  
  
  METHODS
  Medline, PubMed, Google Scholar and Cochrane database were searched using keywords mesenteric panniculitis, retractile mesenteritis, mesenteric lipodystrophy and sclerosing mesenteritis. Data was collated into a single excel database, transferred into SPSS (Version 21.0) and analyzed.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Patients diagnosed with SM were between ages of 3 and 88 with a mean age of 55 ± 19.2 years. SM was more common in Caucasians (n = 28, 60.8% of those reporting ethnicity) and men (n = 133, 69.3%) with a male to female ratio of 2.3:1. 28.6% (n = 55) of patients reported a prior abdominal surgery or abdominal trauma, 8.9% (n = 17) had a history of malignancy, and 5.7% (n = 11) of autoimmune disease. 85.4% (n = 164) underwent surgical abdominal exploration (open or laparoscopic); 41.7% (n = 80) had surgery with resection of the involved bowel and mesentery. 34.9% (n = 67) of patients received medical treatment with the majority of them receiving steroids (n = 56, 83.5%). Symptom duration of more than a month (66.7% vs 40.4%, p < 0.05), underlying autoimmune disorder (14.3% vs 4.0%, p < 0.05) or low protein (14.3% vs 4.0%, p < 0.05) at presentation were seen more frequently in those with poor treatment response whereas patients with tender abdomen (45.0% vs 19.0%, p < 0.05) or leukocytosis (20.5% vs 0.0%, p < 0.05) at presentation were likely to have good response to therapy. The most common complications included bowel obstruction/ileus/ischemia (n = 10, 23.8%) and obstructive uropathy/renal failure (n = 10, 23.8%). There were a total of 14 deaths, 12 (85.7%) of which were secondary to SM related complications.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  SM is a poorly understood chronic inflammatory disease. Our study is the first systematic review of the published cases of SM. Future work is required to better understand this disease and its optimal therapy.
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine, Yale New Haven Health, Bridgeport Hospital, 267 Grant Street, Bridgeport, CT, 06610, USA. prabin.sharma@bpthosp.org.
authors.forename: Prabin
authors.identifier: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-8674-6828
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Sharma
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine, Beaumont Health, Royal Oak, MI, 48073, USA.
authors.forename: Siddhartha
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Yadav
authors.affiliation: Department of Internal Medicine, Yale New Haven Health, Bridgeport Hospital, 267 Grant Street, Bridgeport, CT, 06610, USA.
authors.forename: Christine Marie
authors.initials: CM
authors.lastname: Needham
authors.affiliation: Gastroenterology Center of Connecticut, Clinical Instructor of Medicine, Yale University School of Medicine, Hamden, 06518, CT, USA.
authors.forename: Paul
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Feuerstadt
mesh_terms: D006801:Humans; D008060:Lipodystrophy / Q000150:complications / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000628:therapy*; D008643:Mesentery; D015436:Panniculitis, Peritoneal / Q000150:complications / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000628:therapy*; D011379:Prognosis; D009626:Terminology as Topic
keywords: Mesenteric lipodystrophy; Mesenteric panniculitis; Misty mesentery; Retractile mesenteritis; Sclerosing mesenteritis