RENAL VEIN THROMBOSIS IN INFANTS

In clinical practice, thrombosis of the renal vein is rare, but, when encountered, it requires prompt urologic evaluation. The diagnosis has been established most frequently at operation or autopsy, and it was not until 1942 that the first preoperative diagnosis of renal vein thrombosis was confirmed at operation by Campbell.1With the modern facilities now available to the urologist, the correct diagnosis should be easier to make. Two instances of thrombosis of the renal veins are presented here to reemphasize the importance of a correct preoperative diagnosis. Thrombosis of the renal vein occurring in infancy is usually of the primary type; the thrombotic process arises in the renal vein or in its intrarenal tributaries. In 1945, Abeshouse2reviewed 228 cases of renal vein thrombosis and found that 98 of those cases were in children less than one year old and, that, of this total, 90 occurred in infants