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Beware of air
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We present three patients, treated at our intensive care unit (ICU), with radiological signs of free gas in different tissues.
Patient A, a 67-year-old man with a history of colitis ulcerosa, was admitted with acute right upper quadrant pain and fever. An abdominal X-ray (figure 1) showed free gas under the diaphragm and Rigler’s sign (indicating the presence of gas on both sides of the bowel wall).1 The CT scan revealed a toxic megacolon with signs of a pneumoperitoneum (figure 2) caused by a colon perforation.
Patient B, a healthy 62-year-old man, presented with malaise and substernal chest pain. During …