Beaver tail liver on pediatric chest X-ray

Abstract

Beaver tail liver is an anatomical liver variant presenting as elongated left lobe of liver which extends laterally to the spleen. It can present with symptoms or be detected accidentally. We present a case of a 2-year-old asymptomatic patient who was had an X-ray of the chest describing a shadow of unknown origin located left paracardial and the diagnosis of "beaver tail liver" was confirmed after a multi-slice computed tomography of thorax and abdomen was done. We give an overview of very sparse available literature on this anatomical variant while emphasizing the rarity of diagnosis in pediatric population and clinical importance of this variant.

Keywords: Beaver tail liver; Liver; MSCT; Pediatric; X-ray.

Fig. 1

The image is showing chest X-ray done at first patient evaluation, with the red arrow pointing to the shadow left paracardial.

Fig. 2

The image is showing multi-slice computed tomography (MSCT) of the thorax and abdomen with the red arrow demonstrating hypertrophic left liver lobe called “beaver tail.”

Fig. 3

The image is showing multi-slice computed tomography (MSCT) of the thorax and abdomen with the red arrow pointing out the hypertrophic part of the left hepatic lobe that is imprinted cranially pushing up the diaphragm creating the shadow seen on chest X-ray.