Mustard lung secrets: long term clinicopathological study following mustard gas exposure.

Considering the undefinite nature of lung pathology in patients exposed to sulfur mustard (SM) many years after exposure, we conducted this study to document and quantify lung disease in this setting. In a cross sectional study, we selected 23 patients exposed to SM gas approximately 14 years ago during the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988). We studied their clinical history, physical examination, pulmonary function test (PFT), high-resolution computed tomography scan (HRCT) of the chest, bronchoscopy, and bronchoalveolar lavage (BAL) sampling, and transbronchial lung biopsies.