Abdominal Wall Abscess Caused by Small Intestinal Penetration That Was Difficult to Distinguish from a Malignant Tumor: A Case Report.

INTRODUCTION

Fish bone ingestion is common but rarely causes complications such as abdominal wall abscesses, which can mimic malignancies such as sarcomas on imaging. Abscesses require drainage and antibiotics, while sarcomas need wide excision. Therefore, the differentiation between abscesses and sarcomas is important and often requires multidisciplinary involvement.

CASE PRESENTATION

A 70-year-old woman presented with anorexia and a painful abdominal mass. Laboratory tests showed inflammation but normal tumor marker concentrations. The abdominal wall mass was hard and poorly mobile. Ultrasound showed a heterogeneous, mosaic-like internal structure, and CT and positron emission tomography-CT findings strongly suggested a malignant tumor such as sarcoma. We performed surgery and confirmed the presence of an abdominal wall abscess with small intestinal penetration caused by an ingested fish bone. The small intestine was partially resected, and pathology showed no malignancy. The patient recovered well and was discharged on postoperative day 9. The final diagnosis was an abdominal wall abscess caused by an ingested fish bone that perforated the small intestine.

CONCLUSIONS

We present a rare case of an abdominal wall abscess caused by penetration of the small intestine by an ingested fish bone.