What does Loculated mean?
Medical Definition of loculated : having, forming, or divided into loculi a loculated pocket of pleural fluid — Journal of the American Medical Association.
What is a Loculation lung?
Loculations exert a mass effect, displace the lung and cause atelectasis of the adjacent lung tissue. These features can help differentiate empyema from lung abscess, which tend to be round rather than the lenticular shape of empyemas, and also have thick, irregular walls rarely displacing adjacent lung [4].
What are the two types of pleural effusion?
There are two types of pleural effusions: transudative and exudative. Transudative pleural effusion – fluid leaks into the pleural space; this type of pleural effusion is usually a result of conditions such heart failure or cirrhosis of the liver.
Can you drain loculated pleural effusion?
Loculated effusions, large free-flowing effusions (eg, ≥0.5 hemithorax), and effusions with a thickened pleural membrane should also be drained. When the collection is free-flowing, a single tube or catheter thoracostomy is the procedure of choice.
What causes loculated pleural effusion?
Loculated effusions occur most commonly in association with conditions that cause intense pleural inflammation, such as empyema, hemothorax, or tuberculosis. Occasionally, a focal intrafissural fluid collection may look like a lung mass. This situation most commonly is seen in patients with heart failure.
What is a loculated fluid collection?
A fluid collection (often colloquially expressed in the medical vernacular as a collection) is a non-specific term used in radiology to refer to any focal loculation of liquid in the body, usually within a pre-existing anatomical space/potential space e.g. peritoneal, pleural, subdural.
What is a loculated effusion?
Fibrotic scar tissue may develop, creating pockets of fluid in the pleural cavity, preventing effective drainage of the fluid. This condition is designated as a Loculated Pleural Effusion (LPE) and leads to pain and shortness of breath, as the lungs are not able to properly expand.
How is loculated pleural effusion removed?
Loculated pleural fluid collections may be treated by thoracentesis, closed thoracostomy tube drainage, rib resection and open drainage, or thoracotomy and decortication. Recent reports have advocated the use of image-guided placement of 10- to 14-French single lumen drainage catheters as the initial therapy [1-4].
What causes a loculated pleural effusion?