Symptomatic pneumatosis intestinalis (including portal venous gas) after laparoscopic total colectomy

The development of intramural intestinal gas may indicate a serious postoperative complication and therefore any radiological indication of such "pneumatosis intestinalis" (PI) in an unwell patient after surgery should put the clinical team on high-alert. However immediate recourse to relook laparotomy may not be always necessary and, further, in some cases may possibly accelerate the deterioration especially if it proves to be non-therapeutic. Careful and close clinical monitoring, as is described in this clinical report, may allow discriminative identification of those in whom this finding is in fact transient and therefore benign and who therefore can be successfully treated without operative re-intervention. We describe the presenting features and background scenario of PI early after laparoscopic total colectomy for medically refractory, severe ulcerative colitis and detail the critical postoperative decision pivots.