Giant colon lipoma

Colon lipomas are rare, non-epithelial tumors. They are generally smaller than two centimeters and asymptomatic, they are incidentally diagnosed and do not require treatment. Large and symptomatic colon lipomas are rather rare. Its differential diagnosis is generally made by histopathological examination of the resected specimen. A fifty-year-old female patient presented with the symptoms of abdominal pain, swelling in the abdomen and loss of weight. During colonoscopy, there was a submucosal mass of 8×6 cm, which almost completely obstructed the lumen in the hepatic flexure and was covered by a mucosa that was sporadically ulcerated and necrotic in nature. In magnetic resonance imaging, an ovoid mass with a diameter of 8.5 cm at its widest dimension was detected, which had signal intensity similar to that of adipose tissue. Since the patient was symptomatic and differential diagnosis could not be made, she underwent laparoscopic right hemicolectomy. A submucosal lipoma was detected on histopathological examination of the specimen. The patient was discharged without any problems on post-operative day 7. Definite diagnosis of lipomas before surgery is challenging; they may be mistaken for malignancy, especially if the lesion is large and ulcerated. For large and symptomatic colon lipomas, surgery is required to both prevent complications and rule out malignancy.