Foreign body reaction to inhalation of lentil soup: giant cell pneumonia.

Granulomatous lesions of the stomach, peritoneum, and lungs caused by an unidentified foreign body have been described at intervals for the past 30 years. Muir (1929) illustrates a nodule from the peritoneal cavity showing giant cell and macrophage reaction around a foreign body probably of vegetable origin. Barnard (1940) illustrates a foreign body reaction in the lung round inhaled particles which have a similar app arance. Sherman and Moran (1954a) describe six cases of granuloma of the stomach associated with gastric ulceration, two of which were caused by vegetable material composed of starch-containing cells. Similar lesions were found in the lungs in the cases now presented, which varied from suppurative aspiration pneumonia to granulomatous lesions with foreign body giant cells and fibrosis.