Apoptotic colonic disease: a new entity in a primate.

A Macaca fascicularis died following chronic, intractable diarrheas. At autopsy, the entire colon was macroscopically red and swollen. At histology, the most conspicuous histologic finding was a marked accumulation of intraepithelial apoptotic granules in the lower one third of the epithelium of the colonic crypts. The cells in those crypts showed various degrees of swelling or necrobiosis. Since no other explanation was found at autopsy, it was concluded that the marked apoptosis with marked epithelial cell destruction was the cause of the colonic disease which apparently resulted in untreatable protracted diarrheas in this animal. The term apoptotic colonic disease is proposed for this previously unreported condition.