Cardiac tamponade in a patient with Gaucher's disease.

Gaucher's disease, a familial inborn error of metabolism associated with hepatosplenomegaly and hypersplenism, was first described by Earnest Gaucher in 1882. By 1959, Hsia found published reports on more than 300 cases. Most reports mentioned the bleeding tendencies of patients with Gaucher's, but show that major hemorrhagic complications are rare. We report a case of hemorrhagic pericarditis with cardiac tamponade in a patient with Type I Gaucher's disease.