Spectrum of abdominal imaging findings in histiocytic disorders

The present article provides an overview of the spectrum of abdominal findings of histiocytic disorders that may be observed in multimodality imaging illustrated by clinical cases from our Imaging Center.

We will review abdominal findings of Langerhans cell histiocytosis, Rosai-Dorfman disease, Erdheim-Chester disease, and hemophagocytic syndrome illustrated by clinical cases from our imaging department with histologic correlation.

Abdominal involvement of histiocytic disorders is rare and may occur in the liver, biliary tract, kidney, retroperitoneum, kidney, gastrointestinal tract, and lymph nodes.

Histiocytic disorders encompass a group of rare diseases with a wide range of manifestations in which the abdominal involvement is quite infrequent. The role of the radiologist is to report the major imaging findings and the differential diagnosis; however, the imaging features are unspecific and biopsy usually is necessary to establish the definitive diagnosis.