[Intestinal linitis plastica: late metastasis from gastric signet ring cell adenocarcinoma]

Linitis plastica is a malignant disease that usually occurs in the stomach, although it can affect any segment of the alimentary tract. Typically, this entity shows slow progression and insidious clinical course. We present the case of a patient with a previous diagnosis of signet ring cell cancer of the stomach that had been treated with curative intent 12 years before the clinical onset of small and large bowel linitis plastica. The diagnosis was obtained as an incidental pathological finding after urgent surgery for intestinal obstruction. No gastric mass was found. Linitis plastica should be considered in the differential diagnosis of patients with symptoms of obstruction after resection of a gastric carcinoma, especially if there are macroscopic surgical findings of circumferential narrowing. A long interval after diagnosis and treatment of the primary disease does not allow malignancy to be ruled out.