Intrauterine gas

Last revised by Khalid Alhusseiny on 29 Dec 2023

Citation, DOI, disclosures and article data

Citation:

Radswiki T, Alhusseiny K, Skandhan A, et al. Intrauterine gas. Reference article, Radiopaedia.org (Accessed on 20 Apr 2024) https://doi.org/10.53347/rID-14951

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.53347/rID-14951

Permalink:

https://radiopaedia.org/articles/14951

rID:

14951

Article created:

8 Sep 2011, The Radswiki ◉

Disclosures:

At the time the article was created The Radswiki had no recorded disclosures.

View The Radswiki's current disclosures

Last revised:

29 Dec 2023, Khalid Alhusseiny ◉

Disclosures:

At the time the article was last revised Khalid Alhusseiny had no financial relationships to ineligible companies to disclose.

View Khalid Alhusseiny's current disclosures

Revisions:

8 times, by 6 contributors - see full revision history and disclosures

Systems:

Obstetrics, Gynaecology

Tags:

cases

Synonyms:

Intra-uterine air
Intra-uterine gas
Differential diagnosis of intra-uterine air
Differential diagnosis of intra-uterine gas
Intra uterine gas
Intrauterine air
Pneumatometra
Differential diagnosis of pneumouterus
Pneumouterus

The presence of intrauterine gas (a.k.a. pneumouterus) can sometimes be inferred by tiny hyperreflective foci, with dirty reverberation shadows on ultrasound, foci of very low attenuation at computed tomography (CT) or signal voids with susceptibility artifact in MRI. The term encompasses air within the uterine cavity as well as intramyometrial air.

It can arise from a number of situations:

normal postpartum period ^1,4: it may be seen in ~ up to 20% of healthy patients in the postpartum period
pelvic inflammatory disease/endometritis
post intrauterine instrumentation
abnormal fistulous connection with the gastrointestinal tract