Pulmonary mucormycosis is a rare but rapidly progressing and life‐threatening fungal infection, usually affecting immunocompromised patients. We report a case of a previously healthy young lady who presented with prolonged cough, weight loss, and haemoptysis. Imaging showed left hilar mass with infiltration into the left main bronchus and concurrent mediastinal lymphadenopathy. Flexible bronchoscopy revealed an endobronchial mass occluding the left main bronchus. Tumour debulking was performed using rigid bronchoscopy with cryoprobe and snares. Histopathological examination revealed inflamed tissue with fungal organism. Fungal polymerase chain reaction (PCR) confirmed Rhizopus microsporus . She was treated with two weeks of intravenous amphotericin‐B with complete clinical and radiological resolution.

Aim: To compare the numbers of cord blood CD34+ hematopoietic stem cells (HSC) between preeclampsia (PE) and control (non-PE) subjects and to determine the factors that may influence this observation. Methods: Umbilical cord blood was collected from 28 PE and 19 non-PE subjects. Nucleated and CD34+ cell counts were derived using the Trucount tube-based stem cell enumeration kit on BD FACSCalibur. Results: The cord blood volume, nucleated and CD34+ cell counts were significantly reduced in PE subjects compared to non-PE subjects. Among the PE subjects, systolic and diastolic blood pressure demonstrated a negative correlation with total nucleated and CD34 + cell counts. Gestational age at delivery influenced cord blood volume and nucleated cell counts, but not CD34 + cell counts. Birth weight and placental weight correlated strongly with cord blood volume, and nucleated and CD34 + cell counts. There were no correlations observed between cord blood parameters and maternal age, maternal white cell count, gravidity, route of delivery or neonatal gender among PE subjects. Conclusion: Preeclampsia has a negative impact on the yield of HSC obtained from cord blood at delivery. Maternal blood pressure, neonatal birth weight and placental weight are important factors influencing the numbers of cord blood HSC. These findings should be taken into consideration when selecting cord blood units from mothers with PE for banking. Selecting the heaviest term neonate might improve the yield of cord blood HSC obtained from PE mothers.

Tracheobronchial stenosis due to tuberculosis (TSTB) is a potentially debilitating complication of endobronchial tuberculosis (EBTB). Endobronchial interventions including silicone stent insertion is an acceptable approach to improve quality of life among patients with TSTB. However, little is known about the optimal management strategy for patients with bronchomalacia secondary to EBTB (B-EBTB) and whether stent-related complication rates are higher among this group of patients. Herein, we report two patients with B-EBTB who unfortunately developed bronchial tear related to silicone endobronchial stenting. Both patients were successfully managed conservatively without the need for emergency open surgery. We hypothesize that endobronchial intervention might be more beneficial for patients with pure TSTB and might be riskier in cases of bronchomalacia with reduced airway thickness and loss of airway cartilaginous support. More future studies are needed to bridge the current gap in knowledge regarding the optimal management and role of endobronchial interventions among patients with B-EBTB.

Isolated mediastinal lymphadenopathy represents a common diagnostic dilemma whereby morphological analysis of tissue specimens are frequently needed to ascertain the diagnosis. Cryobiopsy by linear endobronchial ultrasound (EBUS) guidance had recently been described in literature. We described a multimodality biopsy approach of a case of isolated tuberculous mediastinal lymphadenitis in which we employed the 22-gauge transbronchial aspiration needle, mini-forceps and a flexible cryoprobe sequentially. We aim to highlight the novel technique of linear EBUS guided cryobiopsy in acquiring superior histological specimen from mediastinal lymphadenopathy for diagnosis purposes. We also compared the histopathological quality of the specimens acquired from these three different biopsy modalities.