The chest radiograph in brucellosis.

A retrospective study of chest radiographs in patients with brucellosis was undertaken at King Khalid University Hospital, Riyadh. The commonest presenting symptoms were fever, back and joint pains, excessive sweating, headache, and cough. Different chest radiographic abnormalities were detected, including soft miliary mottling, parenchymal nodules, consolidation, chronic diffuse changes, hilar or paratracheal lymphadenopathy and pneumothorax. Soft miliary mottling and pneumothorax have not been described before. The high incidence of lung abnormalities is most probably due to the chronicity of the disease in the present series.