title: An 80-Year-Old Woman With Progressive Shortness of Breath and a Mediastinal Mass.
abstract: An 80-year-old woman from Iran presented to our institution for evaluation of insidious onset of dyspnea and progressive hypoxemia. She had a history of hypertension, COPD attributed to secondhand smoke, and an unprovoked pulmonary embolus that was treated with lifelong anticoagulation. In addition, she had a history of latent TB status posttreatment with isoniazid 10 years prior. One year ago, home oxygen therapy was started at 4 L/min via nasal cannula, and because of her decline, her son had brought her to the United States 3 months earlier for medical help. After a contrast-enhanced thoracic CT scan followed by a nondiagnostic thoracentesis, another hospital informed her that she likely had inoperable lung cancer. She presented to our institution for a second opinion.
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, University of California, Los Angeles, Sylmar, CA.
authors.forename: Alexander
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Zider
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, University of California, Los Angeles, Sylmar, CA; UCLA-Olive View Medical Center, David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, University of California, Los Angeles, Sylmar, CA. Electronic address: kamangar@ucla.edu.
authors.forename: Nader
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Kamangar
mesh_terms: D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000995:Antitubercular Agents / Q000627:therapeutic use*; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D004417:Dyspnea / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D005260:Female; D005355:Fibrosis; D006801:Humans; D000860:Hypoxia / Q000209:etiology; D008480:Mediastinitis / Q000150:complications / Q000382:microbiology / Q000473:pathology / Q000503:physiopathology; D009169:Mycobacterium tuberculosis / Q000302:isolation & purification; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed / Q000379:methods; D016896:Treatment Outcome; D014376:Tuberculosis / Q000150:complications* / Q000175:diagnosis
chemical_list: D000995:Antitubercular Agents