2017 Volume 78 Issue 2 Pages 347-353
We report the cases of two patients with electrolyte depletion syndrome caused by tubulovillous adenoma of the rectum that had transformed to T3 cancer. The patients were a 62-year-old man and a 79-year-old man, both of whom presented with severe diarrhea and consciousness disturbance. Blood examinations showed severe hypokalemia and evidence of acute kidney injury. Colonoscopy performed to investigate the cause of the diarrhea showed a tubulovillous tumor of the lower rectum with malignant transformation in both patients. In both patients, radical resection, namely, abdominoperineal resection with lymph node dissection was performed, and the persistent diarrhea and electrolyte imbalance improved promptly after the surgery. Histopathological examination showed villous adenoma of the rectum that had transformed to T3 cancer in both cases.