-Case Reports-

Acute Pulmonary Thromboembolism after Distal Gastrectomy: An Appraisal of the Guidelines for Preventing Pulmonary Thromboembolism/Deep Vein Thrombosis

Tetsuro Matsunobu^1,2, Masanori Watanabe^1,2, Hideki Bou^1,2, Naoto Takahashi³, Akira Tokunaga^1,2 and Takashi Tajiri¹

¹Surgery for Organ Function and Biological Regulation, Graduate School of Medicine, Nippon Medical School
²Institute of Gastroenterology, Nippon Medical School Musashi Kosugi Hospital
³Department of Internal Medicine, Nippon Medical School Musashi Kosugi Hospital

We report a case of acute pulmonary thromboembolism after gastrectomy. A 67-year-old woman was found to have gastric cancer and a giant lipoma in the ascending colon. We performed distal gastrectomy and enucleation of the ascending colon lipoma. On postoperative day 9, an acute pulmonary thromboembolism developed, and thrombolytic therapy was urgently performed. The 2004 Japanese guidelines for preventing pulmonary thromboembolism/deep vein thrombosis are discussed in relation to the present case.

J Nippon Med Sch 2008; 75: 175-180

Keywords
guidelines for the prevention of venous thromboembolism, acute pulmonary thromboembolism

Correspondence to
Tetsuro Matsunobu, MD, PhD, Institute of Gastroenterology, Nippon Medical School Musashi Kosugi Hospital, 1-396 Kosugi-cho, Nakahara-ku, Kawasaki, Kanagawa 211-8533, Japan
nobu@nms.ac.jp

Received, October 1, 2007
Accepted, March 6, 2008