Endometriosis mimics general surgical disease.

The American surgeon · 1991 · vol. 57(11) , pp. 679–81 · PMID:1746774 · W176467473
article OA: closed CC0 ⤵ 4 in-corpus citations
View on OpenAlex View on PubMed
AI-generated summary by claude@2026-06, 2026-06-08

Six atypical endometriosis cases mimicked common surgical conditions like appendicitis and malignancy, with diagnosis requiring laparotomy, biopsy, or aspiration.

One-sentence paraphrase of the abstract; not a substitute for reading it. No clinical advice. How this works

Abstract

Endometriosis is rarely encountered by the general surgeon but may on occasion mimic general surgical disease. Although usually diagnosed easily because of cyclic symptoms and typical physical findings, six atypical cases are presented. These cases were diagnosed as appendicitis (2), subcutaneous mass (2), pelvic wall malignancy, and lower gastrointestinal hemorrhage. Diagnosis was ultimately made by laparotomy or excisional biopsy in five cases and by fine needle aspiration in one. Resection of the lesion, if feasible, is often curative. If resection is not feasible, therapy depends on the severity of the symptoms, and the patient's desire for fertility. Recognition of the typical appearance of an endometrioma may avoid mistaking it for cancer.

My notes (saved in your browser only)

Condition tags

endometriosisendometrioma

MeSH descriptors

Abdominal Neoplasms Endometriosis Abdominal Neoplasms Abdominal Neoplasms Adult Appendiceal Neoplasms Appendiceal Neoplasms Appendicitis Appendicitis Biopsy Diagnosis, Differential Endometriosis Endometriosis Female Granuloma Granuloma Humans Laparotomy Ovarian Neoplasms Ovarian Neoplasms

Citation neighborhood (sparse)

Too few in-corpus citations on either side for a chart; here are the lists.

Cited by (4)

Cited by (4)

Source provenance

europepmc
last seen: 2026-06-11T06:19:48.454388+00:00
openalex
last seen: 2026-06-10T17:14:06.276822+00:00
pubmed
last seen: 2026-05-13T22:11:54.876058+00:00
License: CC0 · commercial use OK