Influence of slice thickness on diagnoses of pulmonary nodules using low-dose CT: potential dependence of detection and diagnostic agreement on features and location of nodule.

Rationale And Objectives: The aims of this study were to assess the influence of slice thickness on the ability of radiologists to detect or not detect nodules and to agree or disagree on the diagnosis and also to investigate the potential dependence of these relations on the sizes, average computed tomographic (CT) values, and locations of the nodules.

Materials And Methods: Six radiologists performed qualitative diagnostic readings of multislice CT images with a slice thickness of 2 or 10 mm obtained from 360 subjects. The nodules were diagnosed as nodules for further examination (NFEs), inactive nodules for no further examination (INNFEs), or no abnormality.

Progression from near-normal to end-stage lungs in chronic interstitial pneumonia related to silica exposure: long-term CT observations.

Objective: The objective of our study was to evaluate serial CT changes from normal or near-normal lungs to honeycomb lungs in dust-exposed patients who developed chronic interstitial pneumonia.

Materials And Methods: From the records of the national hospital for pneumoconiosis, we retrospectively identified patients with chronic interstitial pneumonia who were under surveillance between 1986 and 2006. All patients occasionally underwent chest CT for evaluation of silicosis or exclusion of possible complications.

Relative and combined performance of mammography and ultrasonography for breast cancer screening in the general population: a pilot study in Tochigi Prefecture, Japan.

Background: Breast cancer screening by mammography is thought to be effective in reducing breast cancer mortality while ultrasonography is not accepted as a population screening modality, although the latter has been suggested to be useful in detection of cancer in the dense breast, relatively more typical for a younger woman.

Methods: Mammography with medio-lateral oblique view was offered on trial in 1999-2000 for 3453 female residents in Tochigi prefecture who also underwent clinical breast examination and ultrasonography. The municipalities that provided cancer screening were informed of the final diagnosis for women with positive findings in the screening trial by doctors who performed the diagnostic evaluation.

Heme oxygenase-1, a potential biomarker of chronic silicosis, attenuates silica-induced lung injury.

Rationale: Heme oxygenase-1 (HO-1), a rate-limiting enzyme in heme catabolism, has antioxidative, antiapoptotic, and antiinflammatory activities. We examined whether HO-1 might be involved in silicosis.

Objectives: To investigate whether HO-1 can reduce silicosis in mice and humans.

Silicosis: expiratory thin-section CT assessment of airway obstruction.

Purpose: To prospectively evaluate if findings on paired inspiratory and expiratory thin-section computed tomographic (CT) scans in patients with silicosis correlate with pulmonary function test results.

Materials And Methods: Institutional review board approval and patient consent were obtained. Thirty-seven men (mean age, 71 years; range, 53-88 years) with silicosis were included.

Pleural disease in silicosis: pleural thickening, effusion, and invagination.

Purpose: To retrospectively evaluate pleural disease on images from patients with autopsy-proved silicosis.

Materials And Methods: The study had institutional review board approval, and informed consent from relatives of diseased subjects was waived. Lung specimens were obtained at autopsy in 110 men (mean age, 72 years) who had been followed up radiologically for a mean of 14.

Computed tomography findings of Caplan syndrome.

We report a case of Caplan syndrome complicated with tuberculosis, which was clinically followed up for 18 years and underwent autopsy. Initial chest radiograph showed 2 large nodules against the background of smaller pneumoconiotic nodules. One of the large nodules showed cavitation during follow-up.