Abstract
Pulmonary involvement in ulcerative colitis is very rare. The authors present a case of tracheobronchial lesions following proctocolectomy for ulcerative colitis. A 33 year-old non-smoking female began to complain of productive cough 3 months after protocolectomy. The chest X-ray showed no abnormality. Sputum culture yielded no bacteria. Since neither antibiotics nor cough medicines were effective for cough, fiberoptic bronchoscopy was performed. Numerous white nodular lesions were scattered in the trachea and bronchus. Histologically, the biopsy specimen of the nodular lesion showed squamous metaplasia of the epithelium and infiltration of inflammatory cells in underlying connective tissue. Inhaled beclomthasone dipropionate (BDI) relieved the cough and the tracheobronchial lesions disappeared bronchoscopically. In this case, there appeared to be a close relationship between ulcerative colitis and the tracheobronchial lesions.
