Pulmonary actinomycosis mimicking metastasis from lung adenocarcinoma.

BACKGROUND: Pulmonary actinomycosis may create a diagnostic and therapeutic dilemma especially in cancer patients. CASE REPORT: A 64-year-old male patient presented with a productive cough, bloody sputum, and weight loss. Thoracic computed tomography (CT) showed a 5-cm mass in the upper lobe of the right lung, and a 2-cm mass in the lower lobe of the left lung. Bronchoscopic examination did not show any endobronchial lesions. CT-guided needle biopsy of the right pulmonary lesion showed lung adenocarcinoma. Wholebody positron emission tomography/CT revealed an increase in fluorodeoxyglucose accumulation in the upper lobe of the right lung, in the lower lobe of the left lung, and in the right hilar and paratracheal lymph nodes. Before chemotherapy was initiated, the patient had to be admitted to the hospital because of massive hemoptysis. Bronchoscopic examination indicated persistent bleeding in the left lower lobe bronchus. The patient underwent diagnostic left thoracotomy, and wedge resection of the lower lobe mass. The diagnosis was pulmonary actinomycosis, and the patient received oral amoxicillin. He underwent successful surgery for the primary disease following 6 cycles of chemotherapy. CONCLUSION: Oncologists should be aware of rare diseases that may affect management approaches in the treatment of cancer.

Methanol intoxication: pathological changes of central nervous system (17 cases).

The nervous system has increased susceptibility for methanol intoxication. The aim of this study is to investigate various central nervous system lesions of methanol intoxication in 17 cases autopsied in the mortuary department of the Council of Forensic Medicine in Istanbul, Turkey. The reasons of methanol intoxication in the cases was likely the unwitting ingestion of methanol while drinking illegal alcohol. Survival times ranged from several hours to days. In 8 cases (47%), cerebral edema and in 9 cases (53%) at occipital, temporal and parietal cortex, basal ganglia and pons, petechial bleeding was observed. In addition to these findings, hemorrhagic necrosis were observed in thalamus, putamen, and globus pallidus in 5 cases (29.4%) and, in cerebral cortex in another 3 cases (17.6%). In 3 of the cases (17.6%) in which cerebral edema was found, herniation findings accompanied to the situation and in 2 cases (11.7%), pons bleeding was observed. Around the basal ganglia, in 2 of the cases with hemorrhagic necrosis, the situation ended with a ventricular compression. In 7 cases (41%), the associated findings of chronic ischemic changes in cortical neurons, lacunae formation, degeneration of granular cell layer of the cerebellum, and reactive gliosis were considered as the results of chronic alcoholism.

Sudden death due to eosinophilic endomyocardial diseases: three case reports.

Eosinophils are associated with various disorders, such as allergic or hypersensitivity reactions, parasitic diseases, connective tissue diseases, certain neoplastic diseases (Hodgkin's disease, lymphomas, and carcinomas), and various immune deficiency states. Eosinophils can infiltrate any tissue and can cause tissue damage. Heart, has been demonstrated to be the most extensively involved and toxicity of eosinophils is well-established on cardiac tissue. We describe 3 cases with extensive eosinophilic infiltration without endomyocardial fibrosis. All patients died after a short clinical course with rapidly progressive heart failure. Bronchial asthma, hydatid disease and drug reaction were considered as possible etiologies of eosinophilia in case 1 and case 2. Case 3 was considered to fall into the "idiopathic hypereosinophilic syndrome" in which no underlying causes for eosinophilia could be identified.