A 42-year old male presented with chest pain. Left pneumonectomy had been performed 15 years before for tuberculosis. A chest X-ray showed small left-sided pneumothorax (Fig. 1). A chest computed tomography revealed herniation of the right lung into the contralateral side (‘buffalo chest’) and a bilateral pneumothorax (Fig. 2). With oxygen supplement, chest pain was relieved and the pneumothora...

OBJECTIVES To analyze the impact on the outcome of video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS) of delaying surgery in patients with previous episodes of pneumothorax. MATERIAL AND METHODS We studied 57 surgical procedures for recurrent primary spontaneous pneumothorax. The cases were grouped according to the medical history. One group comprised patients treated surgically at the first episode...

We report a case of a 73-year-old man, who was scheduled for elective dual chamber pacemaker implantation because of paroxysmal second-degree atrioventricular block. The pacemaker pocket was located in the left in-fraclavicular fossa. An active fixation ventricular lead was implanted into the right ventricular outflow tract (RVOT) through the left cephalic vein venesection, while another active...

Fortunately, contralateral pneumothorax occurs rarely after pneumonectomy. This complication was detected during the immediate postoperative period in four of 340 patients having pneumonectomy for carcinoma at the Ochsner Clinic from January 1942 through June 1958. To our knowledge delayed pneumothorax has not occurred in any of the remaining patients. This lends support to the impression that ...