Spontaneous hemoperitoneum as a rare presentation of gastric lesions: Two case reports

Spontaneous hemoperitoneum is a rare but life-threatening condition. Clinical presentation is usually nonspecific. The aim of this report is to document a rare clinical presentation of two different intramural stomach tumors.

A 40-year-old patient with 24 h epigastric pain was admitted to the emergency, pale, with signs of peritoneal irritation. Computed tomography showed an hemoperitoneum with active bleeding in the posterior wall of the stomach. A wedge resection was performed. Histological report revealed a plexiform fibromyxoma (PF). The second case presents a 79-year-old patient with 24 h abdominal pain, fullness and dizziness, pale and with signs of peritoneal irritation. A voluminous exophytic lesion on gastric wall with active bleeding was diagnosed. Wedge resection was performed and histological report demonstrated a gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST).

Imaging plays a role in the diagnosis of spontaneous hemoperitoneum, in elucidating a cause and detecting active hemorrhage. Tumor hemorrhage may be the first presentation of an underlying mass. The presence of a bleeding gastric mass of uncertain nature may result in a challenging situation for the surgeon, who is forced to perform a gastric resection without knowing the exact nature of the tumor and hence the extent of gastric resection required. To our knowledge, our case is the first of PF presenting as hemoperitoneum. Hemoperitoneum is rare as first presentation of GIST, with few cases reported in literature.

We report two extremely rare cases of spontaneous hemoperitoneum as first presentation of gastric tumor. For the diagnosis a high level of suspicion is required.