A CASE OF DIFFUSE PERITONITIS CAUSED BY TUBERCULOUS PERFORATION OF THE LARGE INTISTINE

We describe a patient who was diagnosed as diffuse peritonitis caused by perforation of the large intestine due to tuberculous ulcer. Tuberculosis was confirmed by pathologic histology in resected specimen of the right side colon. Postoperative examination revealed no evidence indicating active state of tuberculosis. It was supposed that latent tuberculous focus at lymph follicles in the colon, which might be involved on an earlier occasion when the patient fell into incipient lung tuberculosis and inactive for a long time, became active because of some unusual states such as sick and emaciation, resulting in perforation in the colon. Recently, intestinal tuberculosis have markedly decreased with a decrease of lung tuberculosis. But they have not entirely disappeared. We may need one century or more to extreminate tuberculosis. Therefore we should still take into consideration about them in routine clinical examination.