A 37-year-old man visited our hospital with symptoms of vomitting, anorexia and weight loss which had seen in occurrence since early September 1996, and he received a thorough examination. His past history showed that he had never recieved a blood transfusion. General findings on admission included nodular lesions seen on the skin and inside the mouth, and geniutal condyloma, with no evidence of anemia or jaundice. A hematological examination showed slightly decreased while blood cell counts, hypoproteinemia, and elevated ALP and CPK levels. He was positive for HIV antibody, with CD4 cells 10/µl.
Upper digestive tract endoscopy revealed multiple, sharply protuberant lesions with a depression, occasionally assosiated with ulceration, at the top. A biopy specimen from the lesions revealed Kaposi's sarcoma by pathological evaluation. Kaposi's sarcoma develops in submucosal regions, which sometimes makes its detection by means of endoscope-guided biopsy difficult. As patients with HIV infection are increasing in number, Kaposi's sarcoma is one of the diseases we should be directing our attention to.
