Abstract

Metastasis from lung cancer to the small bowel is rare and this accounts for 0.2% to 0.5% of all the cases of metastasis from lung cancer. In most cases, the patients are asymptomatic and they can show signs of bleeding, intestinal obstruction, perforation and so on. A better diagnostic approach to the small bowel has recently been made possible through capsule endoscopy and double balloon enteroscopy (DBE), and they have a higher diagnostic rate for small bowel bleeding compared with that of the previous diagnostic tests. DBE makes it possible to diagnose precisely due to the high quality endoscopic images and biopsy specimens. In addition, therapeutic DBE with a 2.8 mm channel enables performing more kinds of therapeutic procedures than diagnostic DBE with a 2.2 mm channel. If small bowel metastasis is suspected on ¹⁸FDG-PET/CT, then DBE can be considered for making a pathologic diagnosis. We report here on a case of small bowel metastasis from non small cell lung cancer in a 39-year-old woman who complained of hematochezia and we review the relevant literature. (Korean J Gastrointest Endosc 2011;42:47-51)

• Keywords: Non-small cell lung cancer, Small bowel, Metastasis, Double balloon enteroscopy, Hematochezia