Portal vein entrance of splenic erythrocytic progenitor cells and local hypoxia of liver, two events cause intrahepatic splenosis.

Intrahepatic splenosis is a rare disorder of ectopic erythropoiesis in the liver. Although traumatic splenic rupture is the common factor in public cases, the mechanism of long latency is still unknown. The correlation between aging and hepatitis virus infection with the diagnosed occurrence was reported in a limited number of cases; nevertheless, it suggested that ectopic erythropoiesis in the liver could be induced by the hepatic disorder. Based on the susceptibility of the splenic erythropoiesis response to hypoxia and the inevitability of hypoxia caused by aging or pathological changes, we hypothesized that the two events caused the occurrence of the intrahepatic splenosis, the migration of the erythrocytic progenitor cells via the portal vein following traumatic splenic rupture, and the local induction of erythropoiesis by hypoxia.