The effect of thoracentesis on pulmonary gas exchange was studied in 33 patients with unilateral pleural effusions of various causes. Arterial blood gases were measured before thoracentesis and at 20 minutes, two hours, and 24 hours after the procedure. In 13 patients alveolar arterial oxygen gradient (PA-ao2), physiological dead space:tidal volume ratio (VD/VT), physiological shunt, and "anato...

OBJECTIVES Timing to video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) in hemothorax is based on preventing acute and long-term complications of retained blood products in the pleural space, including pleural space infection. We propose that the persistence of blood in the pleural space induces a proinflammatory state, independent of active infection. METHODS We identified six patients with a hemot...

INTRODUCTION Pleural effusion induced by sarcoidosis is rare, and pleural sarcoidosis is often diagnosed by thoracoscopic surgery. The diagnosis of pleural sarcoidosis using thoracentesis may be less invasive when sarcoidosis is already diagnosed histologically in more than one organ specimen. Here we report the case of a 64-year-old woman with pleural sarcoidosis diagnosed on the basis of an i...

A position paper by the American College of Physicians states, " Thoracentesis is relatively uncomplicated technically, well tolerated, and quite safe. " This conclusion is reflected in current practice patterns in university hospitals, where house officers routinely perform thoracenteses. Prospective studies22 of house officer thoracenteses do not support the concept that the procedure is easy...

Unexpandable lung is the inability of the lung to expand to the chest wall allowing for normal visceral and parietal pleural apposition. It is the direct result of either pleural disease, endobronchial obstruction resulting in lobar collapse, or chronic atelectasis. Unexpandable lung occurring as a consequence of active or remote pleural disease may present as a post-thoracentesis hydropneumoth...

INTRODUCTION Ortner's syndrome is defined as left recurrent laryngeal nerve palsy caused by a cardiovascular pathology. Here we report the case of a 68-year-old man who presented to our hospital with hoarseness, whose initial chest imaging mimicked a thoracic neoplastic process with left pleural effusion. The final diagnosis was Ortner's syndrome due to the silent rupture of a thoracoabdominal ...

Congenital lung malformations can result in significant morbidity and mortality in children. Pulmonary sequestration is an uncommon congenital malformation of the lung that can cause complications even in fetal life. We herein present a newborn with extra-lobar sequestration (ELS) that lead to hydrops fetalis necessitating fetal intervention.