Radio Imaging of Pneumonia: A Comprehensive Review

Abstract

Pneumonia, a major leading problem existing since centuries, is considered a respiratory infection including all the parts of the respiratory tract. In the case of medical health, it can be classified into two major categories; CAP (Community-acquired pneumonia), and HAP (Hospital-acquired pneumonia). This infection cause is defined by the existence of various bacteria, fungi, parasites, and viruses inside the body causing sepsis and other difficulties related to the upper respiratory tract. The survival rate from pneumonia is very low when it is diagnosed much later. Pneumonia highly affects the children of the age group of 0-5 years and the elderly aged more than 50 years or in their 60s. The risk of getting infected primarily depends on the immune response of the host and the species of pneumonia. Traditional radiography should always be the first step in any imaging assessment. When normal radiography results are inconclusive, computed tomography is required. The optimum approach to pulmonary infectious processes is a combination of pattern recognition and clinical expertise. However, nowadays it's easy to detect the infection by means of radiological and clinical investigations. As pneumonia is much more manifested in the case of COVID infection, so research is still going on in this field. This article explains the different elements of pneumonia, including definition, risk factors, aetiological agents, diagnosis, treatment, and prevention, with a focus on current developments.