Neonatal hemoperitoneum caused by a congenital liver angioma.

Severe intraabdominal bleeding in neonates within 24 hours after birth are an extremely seldom event. In our neonate, the intraabdominal bleeding was diagnosed by the clinical picture and by abdominal ultrasound examination. The etiology for this bleeding was primarily a blunt abdominal trauma as described in most cases of the liver; however, histology showed a congenital cavernous angioma of the liver resulting in a different tensile strength of this part of the liver in comparison with the rest of the liver tissue. Therefore, a relatively blunt abdominal trauma caused a rupture of the liver in a histologically altered part, which histologically was found to be a relatively soft and fragile tumor of the liver.