Small bowel obstruction due to intraluminal metastasis from malignant melanoma

Comprehensive Diagnosis and Management of Malignant Bowel Obstruction: A Review

Malignant bowel obstruction is a common complication of advanced gastrointestinal, gynecologic, and genitourinary tumors. Patients present with nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, and constipation. Cross-sectional imaging is essential to make a diagnosis of bowel obstruction. Initial management is conservative with fluid replacement, electrolyte replacement, bowel rest and sometimes nasogastric decompression. Numerous advanced options exist for definitive management, though none are overly promising but nevertheless may improve quality and quantity of life. Surgical bypass, endoscopic stenting, and endoscopic decompression are some of the options with variable efficacy and are employed in select patients. Chemotherapy may be utilized if the bowel obstruction resolves to reduce tumor burden in a limited number of patients. Parenteral nutrition is an option and should typically be used in surgical patients with good functional and nutritional status with limited tumor burden or curative intent. Palliative care and hospice should be discussed in patients with advanced malignancy who present with peritoneal carcinomatosis or multiple levels of obstruction. Overall prognosis of malignant bowel obstruction is poor, and median survival ranges from 26 to 192 days.

Primary Small Bowel Melanoma: A Case Report and Review of Literature

Background

The present study analyzes diagnostic and therapeutic surgical aspects of primary small bowel melanoma, describing the clinical case and reviewing the literature. Malignant melanomas represent 1–3% of all malignant tumors of the gastrointestinal tract and are therefore uncommon. Only a few cases of metastatic melanoma (1–5%) are diagnosed in the early stages, while still asymptomatic. They show up as imaging exam findings and have better chance of treatment. Most of the time, the diagnosis is late and made in the presence of complications. The final diagnosis frequently depends on the surgical intervention after a serious complication.

Case report

This case report refers to a 55-year-old male patient, complaining of abdominal pain, blackened stools, and palpable tumor in the abdomen for ~30 days. A tomography scan was performed, which revealed the thickening and parietal enhancement of the small intestine loops with mesenteric adenomegaly and intermingled collection. For diagnostic confirmation, a laparoscopy was performed, which revealed a tumor at the jejunal level, and its resection was performed in the same act. The anatomopathological examination revealed that it was a primary small bowel melanoma.

Conclusion

The bibliographic research of the small bowel melanoma demonstrated that, in this situation, the lesion can be interpreted as a primary site or metastatic lesion, considering the possibility of a single primary lesion, whose diagnosis becomes more laborious. In such cases, adjuvant therapy must be considered. The expected 5-year survival is about 9–13%.