Lung, diaphragm and liver showing pulmonary abscess
Object numberGC.7748
TitleLung, diaphragm and liver showing pulmonary abscess
DescriptionWet specimen.
Section of a portion of a right lung with adjacent portion of the diaphragm and liver, showing a pulmonary abscess due to secondary infection with entamoeba histolytica of dysentery.
From a soldier on service in Egypt admitted to hospital on the 2nd of July 1915 complaining of diarrhoea and furunculosis of over three months’ duration. He had nausea and colicky pains but no abdominal tenderness. Agglutination tests for enteric and paratyphoid A and B fevers proved negative. No amoebae were found in the stools. Dullness to percussion, continuous with that of the liver, developed over the base of the right lung. There was expectoration of a thin brown pus suggestive microscopically of hepatic tissue.
Through an exploratory needle pus was obtained in the right seventh intercostal space. Portions of rib were resected, the pleura opened and an abscess in the base of the lung evacuated and hepatic abscess (15.(I).f.9) reached through the diaphragm. Death occurred some hours later. On post-mortem examination many small ulcers, some of which were healed, were found scattered throughout the entire length of the large intestine.
The pulmonary abscess forms an irregular cavity with sloughy walls surrounded by a necrotic-looking zone beyond which the neighbouring pulmonary parenchyma has undergone consolidation. The lung is adherent to the diaphragm which is not thickened, and subjacent to the diaphragm the liver is adherent and contains irregular abscess cavities the result of the amoebic infection.
Production date 1915 - 1915
Production periodTwentieth century, early
Object categoryAnatomical, specimen