Pneumonectomy
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A pneumonectomy (or pneumectomy) is an surgical procedure to remove a lung. Removal of one lobe of the lung is referred to as a lobectomy, and that of a segment of the lung as a segmentectomy. The term pneumonectomy may also be used in a more general sense to encompass removal of all or part of a lung.
The most common cause for a pneumonectomy is to excise tumourous tissue arising from lung cancer. Other indications for lobectomy include solitary pulmonary nodule (the possibility of undiagnosed small cell cancer in this instance is not necessarily a reason for avoiding thoracotomy), bronchiectasis where other forms of trearment have failed, particularly if it is localised and recurrent hemoptysis is present. In the days prior to AKT, tuberculosis was sometimes treated surgically by pneumonectomy.
It is clear that the operation will reduce the respiratory capacity of the patient; before conducting a pneumonectomy, the surgeon will evaluate the ability of the patient to function after the lung tissue is removed.
[edit] Pioneering dates
- 1895: first pneumonectomy in multiple stages by William Macewen on a patient with tuberculosis and emphysema
- 1931: first successful pneumonectomy in two stages by Rudolph Nissen on a patient with crush injury to the thorax
- 1932: first lobectomy, by Harold Brunn
- 1933: first successful single-stage total pneumonectomy by Graham and Singer
- 1939: first segmentectomy, by Churchill and Belsey
[edit] References
- Fuentes, P.Pneumonectomy: historical perspective and prospective insight European Journal of Cardio-thoracic Surgery 23 439–445
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