Forty one patients underwent bronchoscopic fine needle aspiration and biopsy of visible endobronchial lesions. Adequate materials for opinion was obtained in 38 (92.7%) aspirates and all biopsies. 13 aspirates (31.7%) and 28 biopsies (68.3%) were diagnostic. Only one patient with a necrotic endobronchial growth was diagnosed exclusively by needle aspiration. Overall, this procedure did not add significantly to the results obtained on biopsy. Routine needle aspiration of visible endobronchial lesions is not useful except in certain specific situations.

Records of 256 patients who underwent transbronchial biopsies over a seven year period were analyzed. About 75% were males and about 50% were in the 41-60 age group. In 79 out of the 256 (30.9%), this procedure confirmed clinical suspicion while in 24 others, the biopsy confirmed the diagnosis which had not been clinically considered mostly likely; altogether 103 (40.2%) out of 256 patients had a diagnosis established. Suspected malignancy (34.4%), interstitial lung fibrosis (23.8%), sarcoidosis and tuberculosis (14.5% each) were the main reason for performing the procedure. Complications were mainly bleeding in 14 (5.5%) and pneumothoraces in three patients.

Sialic acid, hexose, hexosamine, and fucose were estimated in pleural effusions of 60 lung cancer patients to establish their significance as markers of lung malignant pleural effusions. Pleural effusions of lung cancer patients exhibited significantly higher levels of sialic acid(12.9±1.7 mg/dl vs 10.5±0.5 mg/dl, p<0.001), hexose(8.2±0.9 mg/dl vs 7.8±0.8 mg/dl, p<0.01), hexosamine(11.1±1.5 mg/dl vs 9.6±0.5 mg/dl, p<0.001) and fucose (8.1±0.7 mg/dl vs 7.7±0.3 mg/dl, P<0.001) compared to the non-malignant pleural effusions. It is there suggested that these findings may have clinical implications and help in the diagnosis of pleural effusions associated with lung malignancy.

The present study was carried out to evaluate the specific IgG immunoresponses to Aspergillus fumigatus as an important diagnostic criteria in allergic bronchopulmonary aspergillosis (ABPA). Five definite ABPA cases, six suspected ABPA cases, 15 asthmatics and 10 normal healthy controls were studied. The results were correlated with the primary criteria of Rosenberg. The specific IgG antibodies were significantly higher in the five definite ABPA cases and the remaining cases were found to be nonreactive apart from the two suspected ABPA cases where weak immunoresponses were observed. The specificity and sensitivity of the test was 90% and 95% respectively. In view of the consistently high specific absorbance ratios in the definite ABPA cases as confirmed by CT scan, this may be considered as one of the major diagnostic criteria.

We report two cases of marfan’s syndrome with multiple episodes of pneumothorax which required draining procedures.

A 65 year male chronic smoker presented with a non – healing ulcer of the tongue mistaken for malignancy However, a biopsy realed histopathological features compatible with tuberculosis. Tuberculosis of tongue was confirmed by isolation of Mycobacterium tuberculosis in culture and was managed successfully with antituberculosis treatment.