Giant duodenal ulcer: the hepatic intra-arterial chemotherapy variant

Giant duodenal ulcers are extensive ulcers, more than 2.5 cm in diameter, that involve a large portion of the duodenal bulb. These atypical duodenal ulcers create serious problems to the patient and the physician, are frequently complicated by bleeding and penetration, and have a high mortality rate. Most of the reported cases were classified as a severe variant of the common peptic ulcer disease, others were associated with the Zollinger Ellison syndrome. We report here four patients with giant duodenal ulcers but with a different and definitive aetiology: hepatic intra-arterial chemotherapy infusion for liver metastase or primary hepatocellular carcinoma.