Tuberculosis of the gastric cardia mimicking gastric carcinoma

In this case report, a male patient in his 50's presented with right-sided neck swelling for 2 months and an acute episode of hematochezia along with vague abdominal and systemic symptoms for 2-3 years. The clinical suspicion was gastric carcinoma. Fine needle aspiration cytology (FNAC) from the neck swelling was inconclusive, and upper gastrointestinal (GI) endoscopy was normal. However, contrast enhanced CT neck, chest, and abdomen revealed focal, heterogeneously enhancing wall thickening in the cardia of the stomach with periportal and perigastric nodes showing peripheral rim enhancement; ascites and peritoneal thickening; a cold abscess in the right axilla; cervical and mediastinal lymph nodes with central hypodensity; and tree-in-bud opacities with sub-segmental consolidation in the lower lobe of the left lung. A diagnosis of disseminated tuberculosis was made, and the patient was successfully treated with empirical antitubercular therapy. This case highlights an uncommon presentation of tuberculosis of gastric cardia and a need to have a high index of suspicion, even in the absence of positive microbiological confirmation of the disease.