Thoracic lymphadenopathy in benign diseases: A state of the art review

• Autor(a) principal: Nin, Carlos Schueler
• Data de Publicação: 2016
• Outros Autores: Souza, Vinicius Valerio Silveira de, Amaral, Ricardo Holderbaum do, Schuhmacher Neto, Roberto, Alves, Giordano Rafael Tronco, Marchiori, Edson, Irion, Klaus Loureiro, Balbinot, Fernanda, Meirelles, Gustavo de Souza Portes [UNIFESP], Santana, Pablo, Gomes, Antonio Carlos Portugal, Hochhegger, Bruno
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Institucional da UNIFESP
• Texto Completo: https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.rmed.2016.01.021; https://repositorio.unifesp.br/handle/11600/57924
• topic: Lymphadenopathy; Thoracic disease; Benign disease; Computed tomography

Lymphadenopathy is a common radiological finding in many thoracic diseases and may be caused by a variety of infectious, inflammatory, and neoplastic conditions. This review aims to describe the patterns of mediastinal and hilar lymphadenopathy found in benign diseases in immunocompetent patients. Computed tomography is the method of choice for the evaluation of lymphadenopathy, as it is able to demonstrate increased size of individual nodes, abnormalities of the interface between the mediastinum and lung, invasion of surrounding fat, coalescence of adjacent nodes, obliteration of the mediastinal fat, and hypo- and hyperdensity in lymph nodes. Intravenous contrast enhancement may be needed to help distinguish nodes from vessels. The most frequent infections resulting in this finding are tuberculosis and fungal disease (particularly histoplasmosis and coccidioidomycosis). Sarcoidosis is a relatively frequent cause of lymphadenopathy in young adults, and can be distinguished from other diseases - especially when enlarged lymph nodes are found to be multiple and symmetrical. Other conditions discussed in this review are silicosis, drug reactions, amyloidosis, heart failure, Castleman's disease, viral infections, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.