[Thickening of the bronchial wall in asthma and asthma-like bronchitis]

Small ring-shaped images, related to 2nd or 3rd bronchial walls are seen in prahilar lung region in 80% of chest Xray films, when a bronchus in seen "end on". This bronchial wall thickening (greater than 0.3 mm) is present in numerous lung diseases such as silicosis, bronchiectasis and pulmonary edema. In order to evaluate the significance of such bronchial wall thickening in chronic obstructive bronchitis and bronchial asthma, 78 patients suffering from these diseases have been studied correlating bronchial wall-thickening with the major clinical and bio-humoral indices of broncho obstruction a significant correlation was found between bronchial wall thickening and Tiffeneau index (p less than 0.05), the PaO2 (p less than 0.01), and the E.S.R., expressed as Katz index (p less than 0.001). No correlation was observed between bronchial wall thickening and positivity to allergological tests. It follows that the bronchial wall thickening is an expression of mucous membrane edema and/or endobronchial mucous or purulent hypersecretion. This aspect, though not usefull in the differential diagnosis between chronic obstructive bronchitis and paroxysmal bronchial asthma due to topical inhalants, is indicative of an acute phase in the inflammation process in such patients.