Clinical Image

Clinical Image: Post-Traumatic Pseudocyst

Yalcinkaya S1*, Yapakcı Z2 and Patlakoglu MS2
1Department of Thoracic Surgery, Dumlupinar University Medical Faculty, Turkey
2Thoracic Surgery Clinic, DPU Evliya Celebi Hospital for Education and Research, Turkey


*Corresponding author: Serhat Yalcinkaya, Department of Thoracic Surgery, Dumlupinar University Medical Faculty, Turkey


Published: 06 Dec, 2017
Cite this article as: Yalcinkaya S, Yapakcı Z, Patlakoglu MS. Clinical Image: Post-Traumatic Pseudocyst. Clin Surg. 2017; 2: 1808.

Clinical Image

Post-traumatic pseudocysts usually occur following blunt chest trauma [1-3]. The cases are mostly young adults and children [1-3]. Chest X-ray may not always reveal this entity. Chest computed tomography, however, easily reveals the cavitary lesions surrounded by normal tissue and don’t have an actual capsule (Figure 1) [1-3]. The symptoms may include hemoptysis, chest pain, cough, and dyspnea [1-3]. The importance of this type of injury is the conservative measures usually lead to full recovery of the lesion (Figure 2). The period between the injury and complete recovery is reported as 1-2 months [3]. The length of hospital stay is usually 5-7 days, with administration of analgesics, oxygen supplement, postural drainage, and mucolytic agents. We would like to remind our fellow emergency medicine specialist and thoracic surgeons to keep this clinical entity in mind when treating thoracic trauma patients. In case of doubt, chest computed tomography is of great help.>

Figure 1

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Figure 1
Post-traumatic pseudocyst revealed by chest computed tomography following blunt chest trauma.

Figure 2

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Figure 2
Follow-up chest computed tomography of the same patient 1 month after the trauma revealing complete recovery of the pseudocyst.

References

  1. Zeytin AT, Patlakoglu MS, Seyit M, Kaya S. Post-traumatic pulmonary pseudocyst. Journal of Case Reports in Practice (JCRP). 2015;3(2):30-2.
  2. Yang P-J, Tsai I-T, Liu T-H. Traumatic Pulmonary Pseudocyst. J Pediatr. 2015;167:777.
  3. Cho HJ, Jeon YB, Ma DS, Lee JN, Chung M. Traumatic pulmonary pseudocysts after blunt chest trauma: Prevalence, mechanisms of injury, and computed tomography findings. J Trauma Acute Care Surg. 2015;79(3):425-30.