Background: Over the past years, only few cases of follicular lymphoma diagnosed by laparoscopy have been reported in the world. Since follicular lymphoma related ascites often causes occult disease and lacks specific clinical manifestations, it is often difficult to identify the cause by routine laboratory tests and imaging methods. Diagnostic experience is not sufficient and more cases need to be accumulated for further analysis.
Case summary: Ascites due to unknown reasons often causes problems for clinical diagnosis and treatment. In this paper, we report one case with ascites in whom the reason causing ascites was not identified through routine examination. Laparoscopic examination of the celiac lesions and histological examination of the lesions were performed and the final diagnosis was peritoneal follicular lymphoma.
Conclusion: Laparoscopic abdominal examination is of great significance for the definite diagnosis of ascites due to an unknown reason.
Keywords: Ascites; Case report; Follicular lymphoma; Laparoscopy.