A Mass Shadow on Chest X-Ray in a 40-Year-Old Man: What’s Your Diagnosis?

Foued Bellazreg, Wissem Hachfi, Atef Ben Abdelkader, Zouhour Hattab, Naoufel Kaabia, Fathi Bahri, Amel Letaief

Department of Internal Medicine and Infectious Diseases, Farhat Hached Hospital, Sousse, Tunisia.
Department of Pathology, Farhat Hached Hospital, Sousse, Tunisia.

DOI: 10.4236/aid.2012.24024                

Abstract

A 40-year-old man presented recurrent cough and bloody sputum for 4 months. Chest X-ray showed a large mass in the right upper lobe. Histopathologic examination of tissue from percutaneous biopsy of the lesion revealed actinomycotic granules and branching filamentous bacteria, and therefore pulmonary actinomycosis was diagnosed. These findings suggest that pulmonary actinomycosis should be included in the differential diagnosis of a mass on a chest X-ray film.

Keywords

Actinomycosis; Lung Infections; Thoracic Neoplasms

Conflicts of Interest

The authors declare no conflicts of interest.

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