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A 73-year-old woman receiving chemotherapy for advanced breast cancer was referred for treatment of a nontuberculous empyema of the thoracic cavity (left side), which had not responded to treatment with tube thoracostomy (chest x-ray film, Panel A) and antibiotics selected on the basis of a culture of Staphylococcus aureus from pleural fluid (computed tomographic [CT] study, Panel B). The patient had undergone an ipsilateral thoracoplasty and Lucite-ball plombage for treatment of tuberculosis 50 years earlier. We proceeded with surgical evacuation of the empyema cavity. During the surgery, we noted that the disease had spared the plombage cavity, which we therefore . . . [Full Text of this Article] |
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