Hepatocellular carcinoma masquerading as a bleeding gastric ulcer: A case report and a review of the surgical management

Hepatocellular Carcinoma (HCC) is a common malignancyworldwide. While bleeding from the gastrointestinal tract(BGIT) has a well known association with HCC, suchcases are mainly due to gastric and esophageal varices.BGIT as a result of invasion of the gastrointestinal tractby HCC is extremely rare and is reportedly associatedwith very poor prognosis. We describe a 67-year-oldmale who presented with BGIT. Endoscopy showed thesite of bleeding to be from a gastric ulcer, but endoscopictherapy failed to control the bleeding and emergencysurgery was required. At surgery, the ulcer was found tohave arisen from direct invasion of the gastrointestinaltract by HCC of the left lobe. Control of the bleedingwas achieved by surgical resection of the HCC en-bloc with the lesser curve of the stomach. The patientremains alive 33 mo after surgery. Direct invasion of thegastrointestinal tract by HCC giving rise to BGIT is veryuncommon. Surgical resection may offer significantlybetter survival over non-surgical therapy, especially if thepatient is a good surgical candidate and has adequatefunctional liver reserves. Prognosis is not uniformly grave.