Small bowel obstruction

Small bowel obstruction. The diameter of normal small bowel should be 3 cm or less on a PFA. In this case, the dilated small segments measure around 4 cm. Note the central position of the dilated small bowel, and the presence of valvulae conniventes extending across the full width of the lumen, two features which are used to distinguish small from large bowel on a radiograph. In this case, you can see metal clips from previous abdominal surgery – which allowed us to correctly predict that the obstruction was due to adhesions.