1/464. Blunt trauma-induced bilateral chylothorax. This report describes the case of a man who presented in a delayed manner after blunt trauma with bilateral chylothoraces, a rare result of trauma. He presented with shortness of breath and chest pain. A diagnostic workup resulted in the determination of traumatic chylothorax. His course in the hospital identified a disruption at a level of the 5th thoracic vertebra. No surgical ligation was required because his leak spontaneously sealed after conservative measures. The anatomy, physiology, mechanisms, and management of this injury are discussed. ( info) |
| A case of postoperative left chylothorax in a 43-year-old black woman with hairy cell leukemia is reported. First submitted to pleural drainage, she was successfully treated with a combination of chemotherapy and elemental enteral diet enriched with medium-chain triglycerides. ( info) |
3/464. Pseudochylothorax. Report of 2 cases and review of the literature. We report 2 cases of pseudochylothorax and review 172 published cases. tuberculosis is by far the most frequent cause of pseudochylothorax, accounting for 54% of all caes, with a remarkable association with previous collapse therapy and long-term effusions. The remaining etiologies, including rheumatoid arthritis, are infrequent. Tuberculous pseudochylothorax is usually sterile. Successful treatment of an acute tuberculous pleurisy does not preclude the development of long-term complications such as pseudochylothorax. We do not recommend pleural biopsy initially because of its low yield for etiologic diagnosis. Currently, adenosine deaminase (ADA) values in pleural fluid are not useful to sustain diagnosis or therapeutic decisions. We advise draining only symptomatic cases and treating patients with positive Ziehl-Neelsen stain or Lowenstein culture, and those with growing effusions of suspected tuberculous origin, with antituberculous chemotherapy. Pulmonary decortication should be the last therapeutic step for recurrent and symptomatic cases. ( info) |
| Spontaneous chylothorax associated with primary lymphedema is an exceedingly rare clinical entity. We report a case of chylothorax in a 38-year-old woman with a history of primary lymphedema of the right leg and an inguinal lymphangioma. Pathophysiology, diagnosis, treatment, as well as literature review are presented. ( info) |
5/464. Management of postoperative chylothorax with nitric oxide: a case report. OBJECTIVE: To describe the use of inhaled nitric oxide in the management of refractory postoperative chylothorax. DESIGN: Case report. SETTING: A pediatric intensive care unit of a tertiary care children's hospital. PATIENT: A neonate with refractory chylothoraces complicated by moderate pulmonary hypertension after a complicated arterial switch operation. INTERVENTIONS: Administration of inhaled nitric oxide through a ventilator circuit. MEASUREMENTS AND MAIN RESULTS: The institution of inhaled nitric oxide at 20 ppm resulted in a marked reduction in chest tube drainage and a decrease in echocardiographically estimated pulmonary artery pressure from 50%-75% systemic to 30%-50% systemic. Chest tube drainage doubled when the nitric oxide was decreased to 10 ppm and, again, dramatically decreased after raising nitric oxide back to 20 ppm. After 8 days of nitric oxide therapy, the chest tube drainage ceased. nitric oxide therapy was successfully discontinued 19 days after initiation, with no recurrence of chylothorax. There was no effect of nitric oxide on systemic blood pressure. methemoglobin levels while on NO remained <1.7%. CONCLUSION: Consideration may be given to the use of inhaled nitric oxide in the therapy of refractory chylothoraces complicated by central venous hypertension. ( info) |
6/464. Management of chylothorax after thoracoscopic splanchnicectomy. Thoracoscopic splanchnicectomy is a minimally invasive procedure used in the treatment of recalcitrant abdominal pain in patients with chronic pancreatitis or pancreatic carcinoma. chylothorax, an uncommon complication of thoracoscopic splanchnicectomy, may lead to a protracted, costly hospital course of treatment usually consisting of central venous hyperalimentation, restricted oral intake, and tube thoracostomy. In our series of 25 patients who underwent thoracoscopic splanchnicectomy, 2 developed postoperative chylothorax. Both patients failed conservative management and ultimately underwent operative reintervention, at which time, leaking lymphatics were easily identified and closed using minimally invasive techniques. On the basis of this experience, we advocate early thoracoscopic reintervention in patients with chylothorax after thoracoscopic splanchnicectomy. ( info) |
7/464. Isolated chylothorax after penetrating trauma. A case is presented with a left traumatic chylothorax, secondary to penetrating thoracic trauma, treated by conservative therapy. With this clinical report and the review of the literature, it is concluded that conservative management should be initially performed as alternative to surgical approach. ( info) |
| This study describes a 64-yr-old male with a chronic left pleural effusion following a coronary artery bypass 3 yrs earlier. On thoracocentesis, turbid fluid was obtained with crystals of cholesterol on microscopic examination, establishing the diagnosis of pseudochylothorax. The pleural fluid cholesterol level was 207 mg x dL(-1) (5.36 mmol x L(-1)). This is the first report of pseudochylothorax in a chronic pleural effusion due to coronary artery bypass surgery. ( info) |
9/464. chylothorax, chylopericardium and lymphoedema--the presenting features of signet-ring cell carcinoma. This report describes a patient with chylous pleural and pericardial effusions in conjunction with severe lymphoedema resembling elephantiasis. The chylous effusions and generalized lymphoedema were associated with a signet-ring cell carcinoma. ( info) |
10/464. Variable levels of mosaicism for trisomy 21 in a non-immune hydropic infant with chylothorax. We report the first case of mosaic trisomy 21 with non-immune hydrops fetalis and bilateral chylothoraces. Prenatal fetal blood karyotype analysis of 15 fetal cells revealed a 46,XX karyotype. Aggressive prenatal management, including fetal thoracocentesis and pleuro-amniotic shunt, was performed. A clinical phenotype of down syndrome was apparent after the gross oedema had subsided. Subsequent chromosome study of neonatal blood lymphocytes showed mosaic trisomy 21 with 23 per cent trisomic cells. review of the initial fetal blood sample identified trisomy in 5 per cent of 134 cells. Follow-up study at five months showed no trisomy 21 in 100 cells. This case illustrates the variable levels of mosaicism manifest in the peripheral blood of an infant with obvious down syndrome phenotype, and the limitation of cytogenetic analysis of peripheral lymphocytes alone in prenatal and postnatal detection of low levels of mosaicism. ( info) |