Tuberc Respir Dis.  2000 Mar;48(3):383-387.

Fat embolism syndrome with pulmonary hemorrhage of unknown origin

Affiliations
  • 1Department of Internal Medicine, College of Medicine, Korea University, Seoul, Korea.
  • 2Department of Pathology, College of Medicine, Korea University, Seoul, Korea.

Abstract

Fat embolism syndrome is a rare but serious complication occurring most of the time in patients with long bone fractures. And it occasionally occurs when patient had underlying disease. For example, pancreatitis, diabetes mellitus, alcoholic liver disease and connective tissue disease can be risk factors. The 44-year old woman visited to the Korea university hospital because of sudden dry cough, blood tinged sputum, and exertional dyspnea. We found petechiae on her anterior chest wall. Chest X-ray and CT showed patchy opacities and multifocal ground-glass opacities in both lung fields. Open lung biopsy demonstrated diffuse pulmonary hemorrhage and intravascular macrovesicular fat bubbles. After conservative management, her symptoms and radiologic findings were significantly improved. We report a case of fat embolism syndrome without any known risk factors.

Keyword

lung; embolism; fat embolism

MeSH Terms

Adult
Biopsy
Connective Tissue Diseases
Cough
Diabetes Mellitus
Dyspnea
Embolism
Embolism, Fat*
Female
Fractures, Bone
Hemorrhage*
Humans
Korea
Liver Diseases, Alcoholic
Lung
Pancreatitis
Purpura
Risk Factors
Sputum
Thoracic Wall
Thorax
Tolnaftate
Tolnaftate
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