[Acute post-gravidic Budd-Chiari syndrome. One case (author's transl)]

The sixth case of post-gravidic Budd-Chiari syndrome is reported. In the acute stage of the disease heparin seems to have given immediate favourable results, and the value of long-term heparin treatment is discussed. Post-mortem findings seven years after the acute episode confirmed the evolution towards a certain type of cirrhosis characterized by macroscopically and histologically heterogenous lesions and by persistent liver congestion. Portal hypertension was associated with arterialization of the portal vein and considerable dilatation of the right diaphragmatic veins. The venous drainage of the liver had undergone complex alterations: the supra-hepatic veins were affected with fairly recent incomplete ostial thrombosis, many intra-hepatic veins were reduced to a vestigial reticulum and others were the seat of recent or old re-canalized thrombosis. Cancerous transformation was found to be present in the larger hepatic nodules.