Retroperitoneal liposarcoma of the intestine: a rare cause of acute abdomen

Abstract

Retroperitoneal liposarcoma (RPLS) is the most commonly observed soft tissue sarcoma in the retroperitoneal space. Its age of presentation is between the fourth and sixth decade of life without finding differences between men and women. Liposarcoma is a common type of soft tissue sarcoma, which occurs most commonly in the extremities (52%), followed by the retroperitoneum (19%). Retroperitoneal liposarcoma is a rare tumor with an incidence of 2.5 per million individuals. It is usually asymptomatic until it s large enough to compress the surrounding organs. It is often misdiagnosed due to atypical presentations and the absence of symptoms. The well-differentiated liposarcoma is a low-grade neoplasm that can present as five histological variants: lipoma-like, sclerosing, inflammatory, spindle cell, and liposarcoma with meningothelial whorls. The treatment of choice is complete surgical excision. According to Stoeckle et al there are no survival benefits of adding adjuvant radiotherapy for a resected well-differentiated retroperitoneal liposarcoma.