Computed Tomography in Preoperative Staging of Bronchogenic Carcinoma

Abstract

Patients (35) with non-oat-cell primary bronchogenic carcinoma were studied with computed tomography (CT) and retrospectively analyzed to evaluate the usefulness of CT in the preoperative staging. All patients underwent mediastinoscopy, and those with a negative exploration were referred for thoracotomy. CT demonstrated lymph nodes in 31 patients, 17 of them having nodes larger than 1 cm. Malignant involvement of lymph nodes was present in only 2 of these 17 patients. Nodal involvement was present in 5 of the patients with lymph nodes less than 1 cm in diameter. Of 10 patients who were unresectable at thoractomy, 9 were correctly evaluated at CT. Five additional patients were incorrectly presumed to be unresectable. The use of CT for staging of primary lung tumors needs further investigation.