Highlights
- •Pulmonary nodules following lung transplantation require aggressive evaluation.
- •There is limited experience and no guidelines for this clinical scenario.
- •The differential diagnosis is broad and the cause is generally life-threatening.
- •The most common etiologies are malignancy and infection.
Abstract
The clinical scenario of a pulmonary nodule following lung transplantation is one
with limited experience and no supporting guidelines for the approach to diagnosis
and management. Given the broad differential diagnosis for pulmonary nodules in this
setting, most of which are life-threatening without appropriate treatment, aggressive
evaluation is required. Here we present a case of a 70-year-old female with the development
of a large pulmonary nodule in the native lung four years following a single lung
transplant. She underwent bronchoscopy with endobronchial ultrasound to achieve a
tissue diagnosis which showed small cell lung carcinoma. The patient was started on
chemotherapy and has shown clinical and radiographic improvement at most recent follow
up seven months after the initial diagnosis. In this report we discuss the differential
diagnosis and corresponding imaging findings for the pulmonary nodule following lung
transplantation to aid in guiding clinicians navigate this challenging clinical situation.
Keywords
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: November 11, 2020
Accepted:
November 2,
2020
Received in revised form:
October 29,
2020
Received:
June 23,
2020
Footnotes
☆The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.
Identification
Copyright
© 2020 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
