Balloon bronchoplasty: case series.

Central airway stenosis may be a manifestation of benign or malignant lesions and can be a life threatening condition. There are different surgical and endoscopic modalities for treatment of these lesions. Balloon bronchoscopy is an interventional pulmonologic modality and can be performed under direct vision or fluoroscopic guidance.

The effect of cup versus alligator forceps on the results of transbronchial lung biopsy.

Background: Transbronchial lung biopsy (TBLB) is a routine diagnostic procedure for pulmonary diseases and is performed by using either the alligator or cup forceps. The purpose of this study was to compare the role of the type of forceps in the quality and complications of TBLB.

Methods: This was a prospective, observational, double-blinded study.

Foreign body removal using bronchoscopy and argon plasma coagulation.

Foreign body aspiration can be a life threatening event especially for young children with smaller diameters of airway size. The foreign body can result in body response and granulation tissue formation around the object which makes the foreign body removal difficult. In such situations surgical intervention is usually needed but with interventional pulmonology modalities we can restrict the need of surgery.

Circumferential calcified tracheal stenosis.

There are multiple etiologies for tracheal stenosis, postintubation stenosis being the most common. In this study, we briefly report a unique form of tracheal stenosis with circumferential calcification at the site of the lesion. The patient underwent multiple therapeutic bronchoscopies for palliation without much relief.

A case of 50 pneumonias in 13 years.

An acquired tracheal pouch or diverticulum can be a sequel to congenital esophageal atresia-tracheoesophageal fistula repair. There are variable clinical presentations of this complication, which can be misdiagnosed as asthma. We report a patient with recurrent pneumonia and chronic cough with history of esophageal atresia/tracheoesophageal fistula repair that was dually diagnosed and successfully managed.

Central Airway Obstruction Masquerading as Difficult-to-Treat Asthma: A Retrospective Study.

Background And Objectives: Large airway obstruction is well described as a cause of apparent asthma, unresponsive to the standard asthma therapy. Our purpose is to introduce multiple variants of other diseases that mimic asthma with failure to treat.

Methods: Between the years 2005 and 2008, clinical data from 16 patients with difficult-to-treat asthma (from 3200 patients who were evaluated in our ward for any reason) were reviewed at Massih Daneshvary Hospital.