Human pulmonary dirofilariasis.

Two new cases of human pulmonary dirofilariasis, in a 66-year-old woman and a 69-year-old man, respectively, both living in the Po valley, are described. They represent the 7th and 8th cases reported in Italy and seem to be ascribable to Dirofilaria repens, even though the poor state of preservation of the parasites did not allow the morphology of the species involved to be clearly defined. In both cases, the false clinical diagnosis of lung cancer was based on the accidental radiological discovery of a coin lesion, the nematodes being located in a pulmonary artery producing a small, roundish infarct.