Congenital Midgut Malrotation : Radiological Findings

An, Jae Hong; Hwang, Mi Soo; Park, Bok Hwan; Koh, Jung Kon

Abstract

An accurate early diagnosis of congenital midgut malrotation is essential to prevention of catastrophic effects of volvulus. To evaluate the usefulness of radiologic examinations in diagnosing intestinal malrotation, we retrospectively analyzed radiologic findings and operation records of 17 intestinal malrotation patients, who were radiologically diagnosed. The age range of the patients studied were from 1day to 12years. The presenting symptoms were vomiting, vomiting with abdominal pain, abdominal distention, diarrhea and failure to thrive. The viewpoints of this analysis were the location of duodeno-jejunal flexure on barium meal and cecal location on barium enema. Sixteen of 17 patients, who were radiologically diagnosed, were surgically proven, but one patient with annular pancreas was false positive. In the case of 3 surgically proved patients, malrotation was suspected on barium meal prior to the barium enema, but final diagnosis was determined on barium enema examination. We concluded that a barium enema should be performed on all children with suspected malrotation where the initial upper gastro-intestinal study was normal or suspicious on account of the small incidence of false positive and false negative barium meals.