Newly diagnosed Crohn’s disease, and hepatocellular and renal cell carcinoma in a bariatric surgery patient—dealing with the complexity of obesity-associated diseases: a case report and review of the literature

BACKGROUND: Bariatric surgery candidates commonly suffer from conditions that constitute the metabolic syndrome. But they also have a higher risk for autoimmune and malignant diseases. Obesity-associated comorbidities aside from the metabolic syndrome are often given insufficient attention in the clinical routine, including preoperative work-ups for bariatric surgery. CASE PRESENTATION: We retrospectively report the case of a 65 years old Caucasian patient who was diagnosed with Crohn’s disease prior to, a hepatocellular carcinoma during, and a renal cell carcinoma post bariatric surgery. The relevance of these diseases for decision making in bariatric procedures and current recommendations for preoperative bariatric work-ups are discussed. In our case, the diagnosis of Crohn’s disease led to the performance of a sleeve gastrectomy instead of a Roux-en-Y gastric bypass and a previously unknown hepatocellular carcinoma was simultaneously removed by hepatic wedge resection. CONCLUSIONS: Preoperative endoscopy and imaging techniques can be valuable since surprising pre- and intraoperative findings can force the bariatric surgeon to change the initially planned operative strategy. But the diagnostic accuracy of abdominal ultrasound may be limited in bariatric surgery patients. With the expansion of bariatric surgery, the complexity of bariatric surgery patients is also likely to increase. However, with the appropriate awareness and strategies, bariatric surgery can be safely executed and even contribute to the treatment of severe comorbidities that exceed the metabolic spectrum.