Delayed traumatic hernia of the diaphragm presenting with hypertensive pneumothorax. Case report and review of the literature

Abstract

The diagnosis of traumatic hernia of the diaphragm can be obtained at the time of injury or months-years after the trauma. The Authors report a case of traumatic hernia of the diaphragm, diagnosed 3 years after a blunt thoracic trauma in a 47-year-old man. The patient was admitted to the hospital for a pneumothorax caused by perforation of the herniated colon. He underwent colonic resection and reduction of the herniated viscera but unfortunately he died of septic shock on the 40th postoperative day. Pneumothorax is a very rare complication of traumatic diaphragmatic hernia and few cases are reported in literature. The diagnosis in the delayed phase is not easy since the correlation with the trauma is not always clear.