All articles starting with P

Pulmonary function testing

Pulmonary function testing (PFT), also called lung function testing, measures airflow, lung volumes, and gas transfer (DLCO) via spirometry, body plethysmography, and diffusing capacity, with impulse oscillometry as an effort-free complement, standardized by ATS/ERS 2019-2023 technical standards.

Pulmonary heart disease

Pulmonary heart disease (cor pulmonale) is right ventricular hypertrophy, dilatation, and failure caused by lung disorders producing pulmonary hypertension, chiefly COPD; left heart and congenital causes are excluded, and treatment targets the underlying lung disease and oxygenation.

Pulmonary histoplasmosis capsulati

Pulmonary histoplasmosis capsulati (ICD-11 1F2A.0) is lung infection from inhaling Histoplasma capsulatum var. capsulatum spores in bird- or bat-contaminated soil; endemic in the Ohio and Mississippi River valleys, usually self-limiting, treated with amphotericin B and itraconazole when severe.

Pulmonary hypertension

Pulmonary hypertension is abnormally high blood pressure in the arteries carrying blood from the heart's right side to the lungs, affecting about 1% of the global population and diagnosed by right heart catheterisation.

Pulmonary hypertension due to left heart disease (Group 2)

Pulmonary hypertension due to left heart disease (Group 2) is pulmonary hypertension caused by elevated left-sided pressures from heart failure or valve disease, the most common form.

Pulmonary hypertension due to lung disease and hypoxia (Group 3)

Pulmonary hypertension due to lung disease and hypoxia (Group 3) is a clinical group of pulmonary hypertension caused by lung diseases like COPD and interstitial lung disease, or low oxygen.

Pulmonary insufficiency

Pulmonary insufficiency, or pulmonary (pulmonic) regurgitation, is leaky closure of the pulmonary valve causing backflow into the right ventricle. Main causes: pulmonary hypertension and tetralogy of Fallot repair; treated by surgical or transcatheter pulmonary valve replacement.

Pulmonary interstitial glycogenosis

Pulmonary interstitial glycogenosis (PIG), also called infantile cellular interstitial pneumonitis, is a rare infant lung disease in which glycogen-filled mesenchymal cells widen the lung interstitium, presenting with respiratory distress.

Pulmonary Langerhans cell histiocytosis

Pulmonary Langerhans cell histiocytosis (PLCH) is a rare smoking-related interstitial lung disease in which clonal myeloid cells form nodules that evolve into cysts, mostly in adult smokers.

Pulmonary metastasectomy

Pulmonary metastasectomy is the surgical removal of lung tumors that have spread from a cancer elsewhere in the body, performed in a small share of eligible patients.

Pulmonary neuroendocrine cell

Pulmonary neuroendocrine cells (PNECs), also called helle Zellen or bright cells, are rare innervated airway epithelial cells (0.4% of airway epithelium) that form neuroepithelial bodies at airway branch points, sense hypoxia, secrete CGRP and serotonin, and are the cell of origin of small cell lung cancer.

Pulmonary nocardiosis

Pulmonary nocardiosis: lung infection by soil-dwelling Nocardia bacteria (N. farcinica, N. cyriacigeorgica, others), mainly in immunocompromised or chronic lung disease patients; pneumonia, abscess, cavitation; 500-1,000 US cases yearly.

Oct 20, 2026

Pulmonary nodular lymphoid hyperplasia

Pulmonary nodular lymphoid hyperplasia (PNLH), formerly pseudolymphoma, is a rare benign reactive polyclonal lymphoproliferative lung lesion forming solitary or multiple nodules or consolidation, usually asymptomatic, mimicking lung cancer and MALT lymphoma; resection is curative.

Pulmonary non-tuberculous mycobacterial infection

Pulmonary non-tuberculous mycobacterial infection, also called NTM lung disease or NTM-PD, is lung infection from environmental mycobacteria such as MAC, M. kansasii, M. xenopi, and M. abscessus, diagnosed by clinical, radiologic, and microbiologic criteria and treated with species-specific multidrug regimens.

Pulmonary oedema

Pulmonary oedema (pulmonary edema), abnormal fluid accumulation in the lung's extravascular compartments; cardiogenic from left heart failure or noncardiogenic from permeability injury; diagnosed by crackles, chest X-ray, and B-line lung ultrasound.

Pulmonary paracoccidioidomycosis

Pulmonary paracoccidioidomycosis, or Lutz-Splendore-Almeida disease, is chronic lung disease from inhaling Paracoccidioides fungi endemic to Latin America; it mainly affects male rural workers aged 30-50, causes fibrosis in over half of advanced cases, and is treated with itraconazole for 9-12 months.

Pulmonary rehabilitation

Pulmonary rehabilitation (PR) is a comprehensive, patient-tailored intervention of exercise training, education, and behavior change for chronic respiratory disease, chiefly COPD, improving exercise capacity, quality of life, and hospital admissions, but reaching under 5% of eligible patients in the US and Canada.

Pulmonary resection

Pulmonary resection is the surgical removal of part or all of a lung, ranging from wedge resection and segmentectomy to lobectomy and pneumonectomy, mainly for lung cancer.

Pulmonary shunt

Pulmonary shunt: perfused lung regions with zero ventilation (V/Q = 0), also called right-to-left shunt or intrapulmonary shunt. Hallmark is refractory hypoxemia unresponsive to oxygen; causes include ARDS, pneumonia, PFO, and pulmonary AVMs.

Oct 20, 2026

Pulmonary sporotrichosis

Pulmonary sporotrichosis, also called primary lung Sporothrix infection, is a rare inhaled form of sporotrichosis causing chronic cavitary upper-lobe disease mimicking tuberculosis, treated with itraconazole or amphotericin B plus surgery.

Pulmonary surfactant

Pulmonary surfactant (lung surfactant) is a lipid-protein mixture secreted by type II alveolar cells that lowers alveolar surface tension to near 0 mN/m, preventing collapse; deficiency causes neonatal RDS, treated with animal-derived or synthetic surfactant replacement.

Pulmonary Surgical Procedures

Pulmonary surgical procedures are operations on the lung to remove diseased tissue or treat cancer, ranging from wedge resection, segmentectomy, and lobectomy to pneumonectomy, performed through open thoracotomy, VATS, or robotic surgery.

Pulmonary thromboendarterectomy

Pulmonary thromboendarterectomy, also called pulmonary endarterectomy (PEA), is the curative surgical treatment for chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension, removing organized clot via deep hypothermic circulatory arrest, with 94% 3-year survival in the worldwide CTEPH registry.

Pulmonary valve

Pulmonary valve (pulmonic valve, valva trunci pulmonalis): the heart's three-cusp semilunar valve between right ventricle and pulmonary trunk; opens in systole, closes in diastole; disorders include stenosis, regurgitation, atresia.

Pulmonary valve implantation

Pulmonary valve implantation is a catheter-based procedure placing a replacement valve in the pulmonary position, treating congenital heart disease; the first human implant was in 2000.

Pulmonary valve replacement

Pulmonary valve replacement (PVR) is a surgical or catheter-based procedure replacing a diseased pulmonary valve, most often in congenital heart disease involving the right ventricular outflow tract.

Pulmonary valve stenosis

Pulmonary valve stenosis, or pulmonary stenosis, is a narrowing of the pulmonary valve obstructing blood flow to the lungs, usually present at birth and among the most common congenital heart defects.

Pulmonary vein

Pulmonary veins: typically four vessels (right/left superior and inferior) carrying oxygenated blood from the lungs to the left atrium; sites of atrial fibrillation origin, congenital anomalies like TAPVR, and post-ablation stenosis.

Pulmonary veno-occlusive disease

Pulmonary veno-occlusive disease (PVOD), with pulmonary capillary hemangiomatosis, is a rare group 1 pulmonary hypertension from venous/capillary obstruction; biallelic EIF2AK4 mutations, CT triad, low DLCO, vasodilator-induced edema risk, lung transplant only cure.