Example Of Pathology Condition Of The Chest: Pneumonia Case Study

Pneumonia refers to an infection that causes air sac inflammation in both or one of the lungs (Whiskeytown, 2011). The air sacs sometimes accumulate pus or fluid leading to cough having pus or phlegm. Notably, bacteria, viruses or fungi are possible causative agents of the disease.
In the case of adenoviral pneumonia, there are patchy hemorrhagic consolidation areas that lead to necrosis. Essentially, many associations including the smoking of cigarettes, exposure to wood dust, hepatitis C virus and Epstein - Barr virus are some of the major causes of pneumonia. In addition, the patients tend to have common defects in reparative pathways, a situation that supports the proposition that a single etiologic agent cannot be regarded as the common inciter. According to Marrie (2011), digital clubbing occurs in about 25% to 50% of the infected patients and constitutional symptoms are very rare in most cases.
Radiographic imaging is useful in assessing adult patients suspected of suffering from pneumonia. Essentially, lateral images are necessary for diagnosing pneumonia and doctors need to obtain them where possible. However, the use of chest radiography is unreliable because it cannot show differences between bacterial pneumonia and non-bacterial pneumonia.
According to Muller (2010), imaging features from radiographic exams are not dependent enough to arrive at specific causative organism diagnosis. Notably, the patient’s coexisting lung infections and immunologic status create a bias in the radiographic manifestations. For example, many causative organisms may lead to overlapping radiographic image features that further complicates the reliability or radiographic imaging. However, the epidemiologic and clinical data should be used the imaging features and subjected to virology testing to enhance proper diagnosis. Furthermore, radiology findings are doctors to assess the evolution of the infection and narrow the differences in diagnoses.
In conclusion, pneumonia is an infection that occurs because of exposure to Different causative agents. The manifestation of the disease makes it complex for radiographic assessment. Therefore, it is essential to integrate both clinical and epidemiologic data with radiographic findings in order to complete an accurate diagnosis.

References

Marrie, T. J. (2011). Primary Care Management of Community-Acquired Pneumonia. London: Future Medicine Ltd.
Müller, N. L. (2010). Pneumonia: Radiologic and pathologic correlations. Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.
Whiskeytown, M. (2011). Pneumonia. Universal City, CA: Universal.