Case Report: Sudden Splenic Rupture in a Plasmodium falciparum-Infected Patient

Authors

Nadeem Kassam, Department of Internal Medicine, Aga Khan University Medical College East Africa, Dar-es-salaam, TanzaniaFollow
Steven Michael, Department of Internal Medicine, Aga Khan University Medical College East Africa, Dar-es-salaam, TanzaniaFollow
Kamran Hamid, Aga Khan UniversityFollow
Authar Ali, Aga Khan UniversityFollow
Salim Surani, Department of Internal Medicine, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA

Document Type

Article

Department

AKU-East Africa; Medical College (East Africa)

Abstract

Spontaneous splenic rupture is a rare and life-threatening complication of severe malaria. It demands particular attention since delayed or missed diagnosis can be potentially fatal.

The exact incidence is unknown largely due to underreporting. Acute malarial infection accounts for most of the spontaneous splenic rupture. Plasmodium vivax has been associated with the majority of them; however, on rare occasion, other Plasmodium infections have also resulted in splenic rupture.

We report the case of a 74-year-old male who was diagnosed with severe malaria caused by Plasmodium falciparum (P. falciparum) infection and developed an acute abdomen while on treatment due to spontaneous splenic rupture which necessitated emergency splenectomy.

Comments

This work was published after the author joined Aga Khan University.

Publication (Name of Journal)

Journal

Recommended Citation

Kassam, N., Michael, S., Hameed, K., Ali, A., & Surani, S. (2020). Case Report: Sudden Splenic Rupture in a Plasmodium falciparum-Infected Patient. International journal of general medicine, 13, 595–598. https://doi.org/10.2147/IJGM.S267197

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.