Contralateral Traumatic Hemopneumothorax

Abstract EN

Pneumothorax is the entry of air into the virtual space between the visceral and the parietal pleurae, which can occur spontaneously or to a greater extent in a traumatic way.

In daily clinical practice it is frequent to find injuries that generate traumatic pneumothorax that is ipsilateral to the lesion.

However, there are case reports of contralateral pneumothorax that occurred in procedures such as insertion of pacemakers, or in cases of pneumonectomy.

The following is the case report of a 37-year-old man who was admitted with a sharp wound to the right paravertebral region who developed a left haemopneumothorax due to a tangential course of the injuring agent.

Adequate clinical judgment was followed, and several imaging studies were carried out, leading to the diagnosis of traumatic pneumothorax that was contralateral to the described injury.