Postoperative acute pancreatitis and lower nephron syndrome.

Abstract

Acute pancreatitis occurring during surgery in regions remote from the biliary tract or as a postoperative complication of such surgery apparently is rare. A search of the literature has revealed only two case reports. 1 In the case which is the subject of this report the symptoms of acute pancreatitis first manifested themselves in the operating room during a transurethral resection in a patient who gave no history of gallbladder disease, who did not imbibe alcoholic beverages, and in whom at autopsy no evidence of biliary tract disease could be found. The case is of special interest because of the coexistence of the lower nephron syndrome. Although the lower nephron syndrome is not an uncommon complication of acute pancreatitis, the almost simultaneous occurrence of the two conditions in a patient subjected to transurethral resection provokes the thought that the two pathological processes may have had a common etiology and, further,