Images in Radiology
“Rice Cake” Small Bowel Ileus
Radiology 2021; 000:1 • https://doi.org/10.1148/radiol.2021210625
A 76-year-old woman was admitted to the hospital because of upper abdominal pain and nausea. The patient had a history of laparoscopic hepatic segmentectomy for hepatocellular carcinoma. The patient had eaten a rice cake 10 hours before admission. She admitted that she had swallowed the rice cake without completely chewing it. Abdominal CT showed an oval ball-like 30 mm × 24 mm high-density body in the upper jejunum and the dilated proximal jejunum (Figure, parts a, b). She was treated with fasting and parenteral intravenous saline. She fully recovered in 24 hours. Rice cake is an ethnic food in some Asian countries, also known as “mochi” (Figure, part c) in Japanese. This may be a cause of small bowel ileus because of the viscosity of incompletely chewed morsels. Rice cake ileus frequently occurs in Japan.