Abstract

Pulmonary echinococcosis is a parasitic disease caused by larval forms of Echinococcus granulosus sensu lato. A 10-years-old patient from the rural central region of the province of Tungurahua, Ecuador with previous history of recurrent respiratory and intestinal infections was admitted in the Hospital. The patient was having symptoms of cough, hemoptysis, weight loss, sore throat, headache and malaise at the time of admission. Preliminary physical examination has shown that the O₂ saturation was greater than 95%. The image studies revealed a chest level radioopaque lesion in the right upper lobe of the lung. The blood tests revealed leukocytosis with neutrophilia, eosinophilia and PCR negative. Clinical examination, laboratory findings and imaging reports concluded atypical pneumonia. A simple lung tomography was performed as the patient’s condition didn’t improve with the treatment for pneumonia.  Tomography studies suggested a picture of active tuberculosis but the patient showed negative to tuberculin skin test (TST). So, the pulmonology department performed lung biopsy and the subsequent histopathological tests were found to be positive for pulmonary echinococcosis. Then, the patient was given with specific antiparasitic therapy as treatment. It is highly recommended to consider parasitic zoonosis pulmonary location during the differential diagnosis in infants with hemoptysis.

Keywords: Pulmonary echinococcosis; Hemoptysis; Echinococcus granulosus