The clinical implications of bronchoscopy in hemoptysis patients with no explainable lesions in computed tomography

Hemoptysis is observed frequently in patients, although chest computed tomography (CT) shows no explainable lesion as the cause of hemoptysis. However, the clinical course of these patients has not been reported fully.

This study included patients who visited Seoul National University Hospital and Seoul National University Bundang Hospital to be treated for hemoptysis from January 2003 through October 2009 and who had no lesion causing hemoptysis in chest CT. We retrospectively analyzed their bronchoscopic and clinical findings.

A total of 228 patients were included, and the mean follow-up duration was 781 days. All patients underwent bronchoscopy. The bronchoscopic findings of 191 patients (83.8%) were negative for hemoptysis and showed the possible causes of bleeding in 37 patients (16.2%). Forty-three of the 191 patients with negative bronchoscopic findings had oronasopharyngeal problems or were using anticoagulants. After excluding these 43 patients, hemoptysis recurred in 29 (19.6%) of the remaining patients. Thirteen of the patients whose bronchoscopic findings identified the possible causes of bleeding (35.1%) experienced recurrence. Only one patient (0.4%) was diagnosed with lung cancer by the initial bronchoscopy, and no patient developed malignancy during the follow-up period.

The recurrence rate was higher in the patients with positive findings than in the patients with negative findings on bronchoscopy. Although about 20% of patients with negative bronchoscopy findings experienced recurrence, the clinical course of those in whom recurrent bleeding occurred was usually benign.