• Journal of Chest Surgery
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• v.29 no.3
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• pp.350-354
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• 1996

Pulmonary mucormycosis is a very rare but often fatal opportunistic fungal infection caused by the order Mucorales in class Zygomycetes. Reported overall mortality exceeds 70% and the diagnosis is often made post-mortem. We experienced 2 cases of typical form of pulmonary mucormycosis. One patient was a poorly controlled diabetic and the other suffered from acute Iymphocytic leukemia (ALL). The former was diagnosed by a bronchoscopic biopsy and the latter by a pathologic examination from the percutaneous drain of a subphrenic abscess. Both of them underwent a surgical excision of the involved lung tissue. The patient with diabetes mellitus was successfully treated by surgical resection and discharged without complications. The other with ALL underwent a second operation and was transferred to the department of internal medicine for further management of his relapse of lettkemia. Recent literat re suggests that early aggressive diagnostic effort and treatment including surgical resection in the case of localized forms of the disease results in a good prognosis.