The 13th World Conference on Tobacco OR Health

Objective: The aim was to evaluate patients with chest tumours diagnosed by bronhoscopy.

Methods: We used data from patients record and simple statistical analysis.

Results: We analysed a group of 279 patients with chest tumours diagnosed by bronhoscopy (45% of 620 bronchoscopies in 1 year). 61,6% of the patients were over 60 years, and 71% were men. We detected a very high percentage of tobacco use (85,4% of men and 53,7% of women) and 31,5% exposure to noxes. Localization of tumours were: 84,5% lung tumour, 10% primary mediastinal tumours or metastatic adenopathy of extrapulmonary tumours, 5,4% larynx and trachea tumours. Bronchoscopy had an important role in tumor staging: recurrent nerve invasion (T4 staging) and endobronchial "TNM" staging. We found high percent (68.6%) of late diagnosis: st. III B 32.2% (by T4 or N3), st. IV 8.9% (M1) (which contraindicates radical surgery) or st. III A 27.5% (by T3 or N2)(high risk). Histological confirmation for tumors was 41.1% (76,2% were confirmed by bronchial biopsy, 12,3% by brosaj, 10,3% by bronchial aspiration). Epidermoid carcinoma was predominant 85,5%, and tobacco was the major risk factor.