[Cytological diagnosis of intrathoracic epithelioid-cellular inflammations]

In the period between 1987 and 1989, 441 epitheliodcell granulomas were diagnosed on the basis of cytological investigations, and confirmed histologically. The material involved was obtained via perbronchial puncture, imprint preparations from bronchial biopsies, transbronchial biopsies and thoracoscopic biopsies. The sensitivity of the cytological investigations of imprint preparations in the case of small biopsies is some 7-12.5% better than that of the histological examination. Thus, the histological diagnosis is supplemented by cytology. In 92.9% of the cases, granulomatous disease was diagnosed on the basis of the evaluation of the perbronchial puncture material alone, so that in these cases, mediastinoscopy could have been avoided.