[Stress fractures of the ribs with acute thoracic pain in a young woman, diagnosed by the bone scan].

We report the unusual case of a 29 -year old woman with emotional instability who presented with acute onset chest pain after severe chronic cough. The chest X-ray and the serological tests were normal but the CT scanning, and the bone scanning revealed multiple bilateral rib stress fractures, caused by severe coughing and physical activity and worsened by the patient's emotional instability.