2022 Volume 75 Issue 7 Pages e145-e149
Five broiler chickens with proventricular duplication cysts, 46 to 67 days of age, were subjected to pathological investigation. Macroscopically, a single cyst was closely attached to the proventriculus of each chicken. The cysts were 35 to 72 mm in diameter, unilocular, non-communicating and their lumina was filled with mucus. Histologically, each cystic wall consisted of lining epithelia, lamina propria, three layers of smooth muscular tissue and capsules. Compound tubular glands were sporadically present in the deeper lamina propria of two of the chickens. The lining epithelia were simple columnar or cuboidal and often formed villous projections. The columnar epithelia covering the projections were filled with mucous granules, positive with both periodic acid-Schiff and Alcian blue pH 2.5 stains and blue with Azan stain. The results suggest that three and two cysts are lined with mucosa similar to the intestinal and proventricular ones, respectively. This is the first report of proventricular duplication cysts in chickens.
