Retrospective Study
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Clin Cases. Jan 26, 2023; 11(3): 576-597
Published online Jan 26, 2023. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v11.i3.576
Bowel inflammatory presentations on computed tomography in adult patients with severe aplastic anemia during flared inflammatory episodes
Xi-Chen Zhao, Cheng-Jiang Xue, Hui Song, Bin-Han Gao, Fu-Shen Han, Shu-Xin Xiao
Xi-Chen Zhao, Department of Hematology, The Central Hospital of Qingdao West Coast New Area, Qingdao 266555, Shandong Province, China
Cheng-Jiang Xue, Department of Neurosurgery, The Central Hospital of Qingdao West Coast New Area, Qingdao 266555, Shandong Province, China
Hui Song, Bin-Han Gao, Department of Radiology, The Central Hospital of Qingdao West Coast New Area, Qingdao 266555, Shandong Province, China
Fu-Shen Han, Department of Pneumology, The Central Hospital of Qingdao West Coast New Area, Qingdao 266555, Shandong Province, China
Shu-Xin Xiao, Department of Hematology, The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, Qingdao 266000, Shandong Province, China
Author contributions: Zhao XC and Xiao SX developed the idea; Zhao XC and Xue CJ organized the study; Zhao XC, Xue CJ, Song H, Gao BH, Han FS, and Xiao SX reviewed and consulted the CT images; Zhao XC drafted the manuscript; Xiao SX revised and approved the final manuscript; all authors have read and approved the final version of the manuscript.
Supported by the Specialized Scientific Research Fund Projects of the Medical Group of Qingdao University, No. YLJT20201002.
Institutional review board statement: The study was reviewed and approved by the Central Hospital of Qingdao West Coast New Area Institutional Review Board (Approval No. 2022-10-08).
Informed consent statement: The requirement of written informed consent was waived by The Ethics Committee of The Central Hospital of Qingdao West Coast New Area since this was a retrospective study and no information linked to the patients’ identity was revealed in the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare that are relevant to the content of this article.
Data sharing statement: No additional data are available.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Shu-Xin Xiao, MD, Chief Physician, Department of Hematology, The Affiliated Hospital of Qingdao University, No. 16 Jiangsu Road, Qingdao 266000, Shandong Province, China. xsxa@sina.com
Received: October 19, 2022
Peer-review started: October 19, 2022
First decision: November 25, 2022
Revised: December 3, 2022
Accepted: January 5, 2023
Article in press: January 5, 2023
Published online: January 26, 2023
Core Tip

Core Tip: Patients with severe aplastic anemia frequently present with inflammatory episodes. The gastrointestinal tract is the most common site for infectious and inflammatory diseases, and its structural and functional features confer on it the most potent capacity to affect hematopoietic and immune functions. We retrospectively reviewed the bowel morphological changes on computed tomography in seventeen patients with severe aplastic anemia during flared inflammatory episodes. All patients demonstrated imaging abnormalities that suggested the presence of active chronic inflammatory conditions and aggravated inflammatory damage in the gastrointestinal tract. These inflammatory conditions likely contributed to their systemic inflammatory stresses and exacerbated hematopoietic failure.