Critical Conditions Leading to Empyema Thoracis Among Patients in Thoracic Surgery Ward, Lady Reading Hospital Peshawar

Abstract

Background: Emphysema Thoracis, an infectious condition is a historically recognized clinical problem with annual incidence of up to 80,000 cases worldwide. Despite the advent of effective antibiotics it has considerably high morbidity and mortality in the population especially in low resource settings.

Objective: To determine underlying critical conditions leading to empyema thorasic among the patients admitted in Thoracic surgery ward, Peshawar.

Study type settings & duration: This cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted in Department of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Lady Reading Hospital, Peshawar from June 2019 to December 2019.

Methodology: Convenient sampling was done. After taking the informed consent, 112 patients fulfilling the inclusion criteria were included in the study. Data was entered and analyzed using SPSS version 20.

Results: Mean age of study participants was 52±6.72 years, while mean duration of disease was 5±1.64 years. Majority of the patients 62 (55.35%) belonged to age group 46-60 years while 50 (44.64%) patients were in age group of 18-45 years. Males were more frequently affected with 77 (68.75%) cases while 35 (31.25%) patients were female. As per common conditions, 74 (66.07%) patients had diabetes, 15 (13.39%) patients had HCV, 06 (5.35%) patients had renal failure, 10 (8.92%) patients had neoplasia and 07 (6.25%) patients had history of immunosuppressive drugs.

Conclusion: This study has detected several conditions that lead to the emphysema thoracis in our setup; however the most common among them is diabetes. To be more conclusive, multi-centered cohort study is required.