Medical Image of the Week: Tooth Impaction and Extraction

Figure 1: PA (Panel A)and lateral (Panel B) view chest x-ray revealing foreign body likely in right main bronchus.

A 66-year-old gentleman with a history Friedreich’s ataxia underwent a dental extraction procedure just prior to 4 weeks of traveling abroad.  He was seen in emergency room for increasing weakness, cough and low grade fevers.  His chest x-ray revealed a foreign body in the right main bronchus (Figure 1).  He underwent bronchoscopy with forceps and basket removal of partially impacted teeth from the bronchus intermedius (Figure 2).

Figure 2: Partially impacted tooth in bronchus intermedius (Panel A); granulation tissue at the site of impacted foreign body (Panel B); and tooth after successful removal (Panel C).

Tauseef Afaq, MD and Carmen Luraschi-Monjagatta, MD

Section of Pulmonary, Allergy, Critical Care and Sleep Medicine

Department of Medicine

University of Arizona

Tucson, AZ

Reference as: Afaq T and Luraschi-Monjagatta C. Medical image of the week: tooth impaction and extraction. Southwest J Pulm Crit Care 2012;5:302. PDF