Coincident pneumaturia and cystitis emphysematosa.

Abstract

Although Boismont mentioned spontaneous production of gas in the bladder in 1825, according to Kelly and MacCallum (1898), it was not until 1860 that the first case of pneumaturia not due to a recto-vesical fistula was described by Raciborski. In 1883 Guiard reported pneumaturia in association with diabetes and said that the other predisposing condition for primary pneumaturia was urinary obstruction. Cystitis emphysematosa was first noted in man as a pathological entity by Mills in 1930, and Bailey in 1961 reviewed the world literature, finding 50 cases of this condition, of which only 13 were known to have had glycosuria. At the same time he found only 46 cases of primary pneumaturia, of which 29 had had glycosuria. The present case is reported because of the relative infrequency with which either of these conditions has been described on its own, and the even greater infrequency in which they have been recorded together.