The radiological findings of pulmonary tuberculosis: the analysis of 117 cases in Nagquka, tibet (with the comparison of 109 cases in Zhanjiang, Guangdong)

Objective: It is an investigation of the characteristic radiological findings of pulmonary tuberculosis in population of Nagquka, northern Tibet. Method: During July, 1996 to September, 1999, the initial chest film (CXR) of 117 cases of pulmonary tuberculosis from Nagquka, were compared with the CXR of 109 cases encountered in sea-side city Zhanjiang, with the same constituent ratio of age. According to the classification system for pulmonary tuberculosis of 1998, double-blinded investigation was made on the two groups and (x2 test was applied for statistical analysis. Results: Higher rate (7.69%) of primary pulmonary tuberculosis with higher ratio of adult patients were revealed in Nagquka group, while high rate (93.6%) of secondary pulmonary tuberculosis was found in the control group. More cases (16.2%) presented segmental consolidation in Nagquka group than that in control group, while in most of cases (74.3%) of control group, small patchy lesions were the predominant pattern. In 31.6% cases of the research group, 4 or more lung fields were involved, while in the control group the ratio was 16.5%. More rare locations of the lesion, like inferior lung field were revealed in the research group, and the ratio of rare location was 12.8% in research group and 0.9% in the control group. The rate of cavity (11.97%) was not high in research group, but 32.1% in control group. Statistical significance was indicated (P < 0.01) by the x2 test. Conclusion: For the radiological manifestations of pulmonary tuberculosis, there are significant differences between the population of Nagquka and the sea-side city Zhanjiang