Expiratory CT scan in patients with normal inspiratory CT scan: A finding of obliterative bronchiolitis and other causes of bronchiolar obstruction

Abstract

Expiratory CT scan is usually obtained as supplement to normal inspiratory CT scan to recognize air-trapping, which is expression of small airways obstruction. In some patients the air-trapping may be the only sign of an early-stage small airways disease in an otherwise normal lung. The purpose of this article is to illustrate pathologic conditions, namely obliterative bronchiolitis, in which expiratory CT scan can be abnormal despite normal inspiratory CT examination, and to highlight indications for this technique in patients with clinical and functional suspect of bronchiolar obstruction. © 2013 Gaeta et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.© 2013 Gaeta et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd.