Search

Background: The cytological analysis of body fluids is the preliminary investigation performed for the diagnostic evaluation of body fluids, helping the physician make the diagnosis and plan proper treatment. The International System for Reporting Serous Fluid Cytology (ISFRSFC) was created using best international practises, current literature and expert consensus to make a uniform reporting system for serous fluids. Aims: The present study was conducted with the aim of recategorising the effusion fluids as per the guidelines prescribed by ISRFRC, knowing the distribution of cases into various categories and assessing their feasibility in day-to-day reporting. Patients and Methods: This study was performed on serous fluids (ascitic, pleural, peritoneal and pericardial) received over a period of 5 years, from January 2017 to April 2022, in the cytology unit of the Department of Pathology, ABVIMS, Dr. Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital, New Delhi. Wherever possible, clinicoradiological and histopathological data were obtained and correlated with cytological findings. Serous fluids were categorised into reporting formats as prescribed by ISRFRC and its feasibility was assessed in day-to-day reporting. Results: A total of 1115 cases of serous effusion fluid were examined. The male-to-female ratio was 1:1.12. Pleural fluid constituted the majority of the sample (436, 39.10%). Overall, 56 (5.02%) cases were non-diagnostic (ND), 1013 (90.85%) cases were negative for malignancy, 8 (0.72%) were atypia of undetermined significance, 11 (0.99%) were suspicious of malignancy and 27 (2.42%) were malignant (MAL). Conclusion: The current study emphasises the significance of cytological analysis of serous fluid as a comprehensive diagnostic investigation that also aids in determining the cause and monitoring the disease process. With the introduction of ISFRSFC, serous fluid reporting is now uniform and more comprehensive, both for cytopathologists and clinicians.

We present an extremely rare case of multivalvular endocarditis in an immunocompetent host which is not observed in routine clinical practice. Multivalvular endocarditis is extremely rare to find in today's era due to the widespread use of broad-spectrum antibiotics to treat pyrexia of unknown origin (PUO). Multivalvular involvement is usually encountered in immunocompromised individuals and is most often due to staphylococcal in origin. It is scarce to find our case of a 73-year-old elderly nondiabetic female with PUO who was diagnosed to be having endocarditis of both aortic and mitral valves showing large friable vegetations. In contrast, her urine and blood culture both had grown Enterococcus species. We successfully treated the patient with parenteral ampicillin and gentamycin for eight weeks, which made the patient afebrile and resolved the vegetation.

Mature mediastinal teratomas are infrequent, slow growing, and often asymptomatic. Traditionally, they present in the fourth decade or earlier and are found in the anterior mediastinum. These teratomas are often found incidentally on imaging, and surgical resection can be a challenge due to the size and location of the tumor; however, complete surgical excision is usually curative. Our case represents an infrequent benign giant (25 cm × 18 cm × 12 cm) mature intrathoracic mediastinal teratoma with uncommon clinical presentation of congestive heart failure and cardiac cachexia. The rare location of the tumor in the mid posterior mediastinum, very large teratoma, clinical presentation with right ventricular failure and cardiac cachexia, preoperative diagnostic dilemma, perioperative surgical challenge, and management marks this case unique.

We report an extremely rare case of left ventricular noncompaction (LVNC) cardiomyopathy sparing the anterior ventricular wall in an interesting “necklace” pattern in parasternal short axis view in a 76-year-old female with frequent palpitation and shortness of breath for the last 6 months. Interestingly, the patient had a plethora of basal septal premature ventricular complexes (PVCs) both from the anterior and posterior aspects of the paradoxically thinned-out basal septum and they were not from the segment of noncompacted (NC) myocardium. Our case is unique and the first to describe the LVNC in an interesting shape of “necklace” sparing the left ventricular anterior, anteroseptal, and anterolateral wall and paradoxically arising plethora of septal PVCs from the thinned-out basal septum deteriorating the left ventricular function rapidly in an elderly female in her seventh decade of life. Although commonly in LVNC, the PVCs arise from the NC segment, in this unique case plethora of PVCs paradoxically arising from the basal septum were contributing toward rapid deterioration of left ventricular systolic function in an elderly patient in her seventh decade of life without the presence of conventional risk factors.

We report an extremely rare and peculiar case of symmetric peripheral small-vessel disease involving only the radial artery of the index finger sparing major vessels in an 80-year-old female with systemic sclerosis (SSc). Our case is the first literature description of bilateral small-vessel peripheral arterial disease only involving the radial artery of the index finger in an octogenarian with SSc. Symmetric small-vessel peripheral artery disease can also be a late manifestation of collagen vascular disease.

We report an extremely rare case of Williams–Beuren (WB) syndrome in a 10-year-old boy with supravalvular aortic stenosis (SVAS) secondary to a large fibrocalcific eccentric shelf in the ascending aorta with fibrocalcific severe supravalvular pulmonary stenosis, which has not yet been described in the literature. Although the presence of peripheral pulmonary stenosis is well described in Williams syndrome (WS), our case is the unique and first to demonstrate fibrocalcific severe supravalvular pulmonary stenosis in WS without the presence of peripheral pulmonary artery stenosis. Although regarded as a strong genetic insult with 27 gene deletions (almost like biting the gene), it has also bitten the heart in this index child and left a large chunk of supravalvular fibrocalcific mass in the ascending aorta causing SVAS.

We present a case of funnel-shaped aneurysmal dilatation of left main coronary artery (LMCA) with aggressive stenosis of osteoproximal left circumflex coronary artery presenting with lateral wall coronary ischemia in a 6-year-old school-going child who recovered from Kawasaki disease (KD) 1 month back. Although aneurysmal dilatation of LMCA during first 2 months of recovery from KD is well known, with median duration for the development of stenotic lesion in coronaries after KD is approximately 6 months and all the cases of coronary stenosis described so far have been described in the presence of large coronary artery aneurysm, our case is rare to illustrate aggressive stenosis of osteoproximal left circumflex coronary artery just after 1 month of recovery in spite of the presence of small coronary artery aneurysm.

We report a unique association of rheumatic heart disease with left ventricular (LV) noncompaction cardiomyopathy in an octogenarian. He had severe mitral stenosis with severe LV systolic dysfunction secondary to noncompaction. Although the association of rheumatic heart disease with LV, noncompaction cardiomyopathy has been described sparsely in the literature, our case is a unique illustration of the presence of LV noncompaction cardiomyopathy contributing toward severe LV systolic dysfunction in rheumatic mitral stenosis in an octogenarian with no coronary artery disease.

We represent a case of interesting right coronary artery chronic total occlusion (CTO) revascularization where traditional wire upgradation failed to cross the CTO. Downgrading it to a Miracle 3 wire, the lesion was successfully crossed. It was further dilated with the smallest balloon (NIC Nano 0.85 mm × 6 mm), followed by serial dilation with bigger size balloons. The present manuscript conveys a message that the rule of thumb of wire upgradation during CTO revascularization does not yield in success always, it is the downgradation of the wire which can also achieve success. CTO revascularization although it has some fixed principles, sometimes, a permutation and combination even giving a fair try with wire downgradation can achieve success.

We report a rarely encountered case of premature and parallel posterior descending artery (PDA) and posterior left ventricular branch (PLVB) in a case of 22-year-old male with effort angina Class II for the last 6 months in whom treadmill test (TMT) was strongly positive for provocative coronary ischemia with structurally normal heart and good biventricular function. Interestingly, all the coronaries were normal without any obstructive coronary lesion. Paradoxically, those two prematurely separating branches were small making the distal right coronary artery (RCA) territory relatively ischemic attributing toward a strongly positive TMT. Small anomalous coronary is a well-known cause of demand ischemia, but our case is unique to describe small prematurely originating PDA and PLVB were the culprit behind coronary ischemia in a young male without conventional risk factors. Furthermore, much premature separation of PDA and PLVB is rarely encountered in routine clinical practice, and recognition of this anomaly is important as it should not be mistaken for duplicate RCA, dual RCA, or split RCA. Our case is also unique to illustrate the association of the premature and parallel PDA and PLVB with a conus crossing the right ventricular outflow tract without the presence of structural heart disease.

We report a rare case of anomalous origin of right coronary artery (RCA) from the left coronary sinus with a peculiar medusa head pattern of left coronary system in an octogenarian presenting with inferior wall myocardial infarction. Although anomalous origin of RCA from the left coronary sinus is the most common anomaly to be reported, this rare association of extensive arborization of left coronary system appearing like a medusa head is not reported in literature so far. The anomalous RCA harbored critical mid-RCA lesion, but the crux of coronary intervention was that we engaged the anomalous RCA with extra back up guide catheter in place of conventionally used Judkins right guide catheter to engage the anomalous origin and accomplished the coronary intervention with buddy wire technique. Our case is unique and the first to describe the association of medusa head appearance of left coronary circulation in a case of anomalous origin of RCA from the left coronary sinus.

Adrenocortical carcinoma (ACC) is a rare malignant tumor arising from the adrenal cortex and it is even rarer in infancy. These tumors are usually hormonally active. We report a case of ACC in a 6-month-old infant who was brought by her mother with complaints of hirsutism and abnormally looking genitalia. Serum 17-alpha-hydroxyprogesterone and serum cortisol levels were raised. Subsequently, imaging studies revealed a large well-circumscribed soft-tissue mass in the right suprarenal region. The tumor was excised, and on histopathology in conjunction with immunohistochemistry, a diagnosis of ACC was given. Only four other cases of ACC have been reported till date in the literature, with an age of 6 months or younger. Hereby, we present a case of ACC in a young infant.

Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) commonly presents with nonspecific ST-T changes in an electrocardiogram (EKG), and a paucity of literature description exists about index presentation of HCM totally as ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) in a very young age. The presence of convex ST elevation in surface EKG in HCM patients indicates disease progression, becomes evident in the fifth or sixth decade of life, and warrants further risk stratification for the need of automated intracardiac defibrillator therapy. We present a rare presentation of nonobstructive HCM totally mimicking acute anterior wall STEMI in a very young male in his third decade of life, which has not been described in the literature so far. Because of the presence of typical convex shaped ST elevation with biphasic terminal T wave inversion across anterior precordial leads with ongoing typical angina, the patient was subjected to right transradial coronary angiogram which revealed the presence of normal nonatherosclerotic coronaries.

Acute appendicitis is a common cause of acute pain abdomen. Amoebic infestation is still a rare cause of acute appendicitis. Herein, we report a rare case of amoebic appendicitis in a young female, who presented to emergency department with pain abdomen, fever and vomiting along with rebound tenderness. Laboratory investigation revealed leukocytosis and mild eosinophilia. Histopathological examination showed numerous trophozoites of Entamoeba histolytica in the ulcerated mucosa of the appendix. The present case report aim to highlight this rare cause of appendicitis which should be treated appropriately to prevent further complication.