[Radiodiagnosis of radiation-treated lung cancer]

Consultation of an exhaustive iconographic casuistry concerning more of one thousand of primitive lung cancer, irradiated by high energies in the National Cancer Institute of Milan, has given in the opportunity of observing some changes induced by radiotherapy both on neoplastic focus and on health tissue near it. In the first instance we observed marked regressions both progressive and complete. In the second instance we saw structural characteristic reactions that can be classified in the, so called, "radiation pneumonia". In the first stage, these are characterized by hyperemia and exudate, liable to complete regression. In the following stages, we observed fibrous evolution which, in a second time, went in to a fixed stage of sclerosis. This produces, in most cases, a "print" of the irradiation fields. Here we present some representative iconographic examples.