A n estimated 150 000 patients develop a pleural effusion each year in the UK. Establishing the aetiology of pleural effusions can be challenging as they can be associated with over 50 systemic or pulmonary disorders. Exudative pleural fluids arise from plasma extravasation and contain proteins and cells from the systemic circulation, as well as those released locally from the pleura. This mili...

Peritoneal tuberculosis is a rare but a severe disease in patients undergoing continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis (CAPD). A 60 years old male, who had been the CAPD program during the last 5 months, was admitted to our clinic with fever, loss of appetite, night sweats, cough, weight loss and cloudy dialysate. Mycobacteria cultures of blood and pleural fluid were sterile. Bacterial culture...

A 53-year-old woman was admitted with right massive transudative pleural effusion and acute renal failure. The amount of pleural fluid reduced in response to treatment with hydration and diuretics; however, the effusion recurred one month later. We suspected the presence of a right pleuroperitoneal communication allowing pleural fluid to accumulate from an origin of ascites triggered by renal f...

Malignant mesothelioma is a rare malignant neoplasm that arises from mesothelial surfaces of the pleural cavity, peritoneal cavity, tunica vaginalis, or pericardium. Typically, pleural fluid cytology or closed pleural biopsy, surgical intervention (video thoracoscopic biopsy or open thoracotomy) is conducted to obtain pleural tissue specimens. However, endobronchial lesions are rarely seen and ...

The practical value of cytologic examination in the clinical management of children with cancer was determined by analyzing 2,363 cytologic specimens collected during a two year period. The specimens included cerebrospinal fluid, pleural and peritoneal effusions, urine and tracheal aspirates from 347 children with cancer. Malignant tumor cells were detected in 266 specimens obtained from 106 ch...

The definitive diagnosis of extrapulmonary tuberculosis is made by a positive body fluid culture result. Conventional culture methods require centrifugation or filtration of body fluid (peritoneal, pleural, synovial, or pericardial fluid) in order to improve the sensitivity. The aim of the present study was to evaluate the feasibility of the direct inoculation, at the patient's bedside, of up t...

The pathological accumulation of serous fluids in the pleural, peritoneal and pericardial space occurs in a variety of conditions. Since patient management depends on right and timely diagnosis, biochemical analysis of extravascular body fluids is considered a valuable tool in the patient management process. The biochemical evaluation of serous fluids includes the determination of gross appeara...

background: pleurisy is a common extra pulmonary complication of tuberculosis, but current methods for diagnosing it are fairly crude. here we product a meta-analysis for the available evidence on the ability of tumor necrosis factor-? (tnf-?) in pleural fluid to serve as a diagnostic marker of tuberculous pleurisy (tp). materials and methods: we searched the pubmed, embase, and google scholar ...