[Thoracic endometriosis--the rare pathology in thoracic surgery].

Thoracic hematogenic endometriosis is a rare pathology. A clinical course hasn't pathognomic symptoms, because of it, the diagnosis is established due to histological study. The article presented two cases of female patients, who were suffering from thoracic endometriosis. They were hospitalized to the department of thoracic surgery of Municipal multifield hospital No 2 in Saint-Petersburg. The first patient had a posterior mediastinum tumor with asymptomatic disease course. The second patient was with recurrent catamenial pneumothorax.

[Value of computed tomography in the differential diagnosis of infiltrative changes in the lungs]. / Znachenie komp'iuternoi tomografii v differentsial'noi diagnostike infil'trativnykh izmenenii v legkikh.

Computed tomography (CT) was performed in 73 patients with pulmonary infiltrative changes of unknown etiology. Their preliminary clinical and X-ray studies suggested protracted pneumonia in 46.6%, malignant neoplasms in 27.4%, tuberculosis in 16.1%, and pyesis in 9.9%. The preliminary clinical and X-ray conclusion fully agreed with the verified diagnosis only in 31.5% of patients. The accuracy of CT in assessing infiltrative changes was much higher and ran to 89.1%. According to CT findings, nontumor diseases were found in 56 (76.7%) patients, malignant tumors in 17 (23.3%). Among inflammatory processes there were prevalent pyesis 23.3%), pulmonary tuberculosis (20.7%) and pneumonias (19.2%). In the group of 17 patients with neoplasms, 8 were found to have central cancer with hypoventilation of a lung portion, 4 had peripheral cancer, and 5 presented with bronchoalveolar carcinoma. The use of high-performance CT is of great importance.