Intraductal papillary-mucinous adenoma developed in the ventral pancreas in a patient with pancreas divisum

A 34-year-old man was admitted to our hospital with the chief complaints of back pain and epigastralgia. The physical examinations on admission disclosed no abdominal tumor. The serum concentration of total bilirubin was 1.4 mg/dl. The serum elastase-1 level was elevated to 526 ng/dl. Computed tomography showed a cystic lesion, 1 cm in diameter, in the head of the pancreas, without dilatation of the main pancreatic duct. Endoscopic retrograde cholangiopancreatography via the papilla of Vater and the accessory papilla revealed an enlarged ventral pancreatic duct and pancreas divisum. The preoperative diagnosis was mucin-producing pancreatic tumor in the ventral pancreas of a patient with pancreas divisum. A pylorus-preserving pancreatoduodenectomy was performed. The gross findings of the cut surface of the resected specimen disclosed mural nodules in the dilated duct of the ventral pancreas. A histological examination of the mural nodules in the ventral pancreas revealed mucin and intraductal papillary adenoma. Benign tumors associated with pancreas divisum are rare; to the best of our knowledge, only three cases have been reported. Although in these three patients the tumor developed in the dorsal pancreas, the tumor developed in the ventral pancreas in our patient.