Acute diverticulitis--an unusual cause of liver abcesses in a young man: a case report

Liver abscess is a rare complication of sigmoid diverticulitis and must be considered within the differential diagnosis. We report a case of a male patient, age 42, admitted to our hospital with chief complaints of a dull pain in upper right abdominal quadrant, fever, weakness, diarrhoea and weight loss of approximately 3 weeks duration. Physical examination on initial work-up revealed tenderness on palpation in upper right abdomen, and left iliac fosa and a 39 degrees C fever. Biochemistry showed marked inflammatory syndrome, leukocitosis, increased level of platelets, altered liver function. Ultrasound examination revealed inhomogeneous liver nodules and the thickening of the sigmoid wall. Further CT scan examination and MRI confirmed the lesions as beeing abscesses and also revealed trombosis of right portal vein. The sigmoid wall lesions proved to be an acute diverticulitis with perisigmoiditis, stenosis and abscess. Patient underwent a surgical treatment of sigmoid resection, but the punction of the abscesses revealed no pus at aspiration, making the surgical excision of the lesions unnecessary. After the surgery, during the antibiotic treatment, the patient developed pseudomembranous colitis treated with specific antibiotics. The evolution under this treatment was positive and the aspect of the liver lesions was improuved.