Woman, 30 y old, sustained a gunshot wound to the right upper quadrant. She was and remained hemodynamically normal in the emergency room.
At laparotomy, the bullet was found to have penetrated the anterior and posterior surfaces of the stomach. There was minimal intraperitoneal blood but there was a right retroduodenal haematoma. A medial visceral rotation was performed.
Right medial visceral rotation |
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The head of the pancreas was injured (without injury to the main pancreatic duct) and the inferior vena cava was injured just below the junction with the right renal vein. The infrarenal vena cava was controlled with a vascular clamp and cephalad control achieved with compression of the reno-caval junction. The bullet was found lying in retroperitoneal tissues between the IVC and right kidney.
Lateral Repair |
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Bullet in retroperitoneum
The gastric wounds were repaired by simple suture.
Repair of anterior gastric wound
Total intraoperative blood loss was 400ml, and she had no post-operative complications.
Submitted by:Luis Pinheiro. Viseu, Portugal
Comments
On 08/03/2007, jose fernandez commented:
excelent images...it´s my first time at reviewing and it´s amazing.
thanks a lot
On 08/24/2007, anthonysh commented:
You commented that the main pancreatic duct was not injured. How did you evaluate it?
On 08/25/2007, Luis Pinheiro commented:
Thanks for the question. In fact I “presumed” the lack of duct injury after a complete Kocher’s manouver. The posterior tear was located about 1 cm from the superior border of the pancreatic head. There was no bleeding or leaking from the tear. The subsequent evolution proved that I was rigth in this case. In doubt, (and depending on the patient condition) an intraoperative ERCP or, alternatively, a cannulation via a dudonenotomy can be done. I never did any!
On 12/26/2007, christine horman commented:
very informitive.good work doctor!!
On 12/27/2007, alsayali commented:
Is it ivolve the anterior and posterior side of the IVC?
If it is involve the posterior side would you repair it ?
On 12/27/2007, Luis Pinheiro commented:
Thank you for your questions, doctor Alsayali.The lesion was just in the right edge of the IVC in the origin of the right renal vein (see 4th image). If the lesion would interest the posterior aspect of the VCI, I don’t think it could be easily repaired. Not in this location! I would not repair it, unless I would be forced to (uncontroled bleeding). “Let the sleeping dogs lie”.
On 05/03/2008, Dr. Pachy commented:
of course you should repair that, one way of exposing the posterior injury is to enlarge the anterior vena cava injury and repair the posterior injury inside the lumen of the vena cava. thank you
On 05/04/2008, alsayali commented:
I do agree with luis that if there is uncontrolled bleeding then I will repair it.
In exposing the post IVC will increase the icidences of stenosis and more harm than the bullet injury .
thanks
On 05/06/2008, Luis Pinheiro commented:
Thank you for you comment Dr. Pachy. In fact any good book of trauma recomends the technique you described above . Also any surgeon who deals with trauma patients must know it. I think it can be very helpfull in other locations (below renal veins) where it’s application can be far easier, and proximal and distal control can be achieved with no major problems. I continue agreeing with Dr. Alsayali: in this location, and without evidence of continuing posterior bleeding, this technique should be more harmfull than beneficial.