CT signs and clinicopathological features of peripheral cavitary lung adenocarcinoma with the largest diameter less than or equal to 3 cm / 中国胸心血管外科临床杂志

ABSTRACT

@#Objective    To investigate the CT signs and clinicopathological features of peripheral cavitary lung adenocarcinoma with the largest diameter less than or equal to 3 cm. Methods     From January 2015 to December 2017, the CT signs and clinicopathological fertures of 51 patients with ≤3 cm peripheral cavitary lung adenocarcinoma diagnosed by chest CT and surgical pathology were retrospectively analyzed. Furthermore, CT signs and clinicopathological features of thick-walled cavitary lung adenocarcinoma and thin-walled cavitary lung adenocarcinoma were compared. There were 29 males and 22 females at age of 62 (56, 67) years. Results    There were 27 thick-walled cavitary lung adenocarcinoma and 24 thin-walled cavitary lung adenocarcinoma. Thick-walled cavitary adenocarcinoma had greater SUVmax [6.5 (3.7, 9.7) vs. 2.2 (1.4, 3.8), P=0.019], larger cavity wall thickness (11.8±4.6 mm vs. 7.6±3.7 mm, P=0.001), larger tumor tissue size [2.1 (1.7, 2.8) cm vs. 1.6 (1.2, 2.0) cm, P=0.006], and more solid nodules (17 patients vs. 8 patients, P=0.035). Thin-walled cavitary adenocarcinoma had more smoking history (12 patients vs. 6 patients, P=0.038), larger cavity size [12.3 (9.2, 16.6) mm vs. 4.4 (2.8, 7.1) mm, P=0.000], and larger proportion of cavities [0.30 (0.19, 0.37) vs. 0.03 (0.01, 0.09), P=0.000]. On CT signs, there were more features of irregular inner wall (19 patients vs. 6 patients, P=0.000), intra-cystic separation (16 patients vs. 6 patients, P=0.001) and vessels through the cystic cavity (10 patients vs. 1 patient, P=0.001) in thin-walled caviraty lung adenocarcinoma. Conclusion    Peripheral cavitary lung adenocarcinoma of ≤3 cm on chest CT has characteristic manifestations in clinical, imaging and pathology, and there is a statistical difference between thick-walled cavitary lung adenocarcinoma and thin-walled cavitary lung adenocarcinoma.