The chest radiographs of 60 adult patients with serologically proven mycoplasma pneumonia were reviewed. Confluent or patchy consolidation was most commonly seen, and involved one lobe only in 40% of patients. Widespread nodular opacities were seen much less frequently (7%). Pleural fluid was rare. Complete resolution was almost invariable, 40% of radiographs having cleared by four weeks and 96% by eight weeks.Mycoplasma pneumoniae has been shown to be the causative organism in 10-20% of all adult pneumonias.1 2 The illness can be of variable severity and while there may be some suggestive clinical features,3 the diagnosis is not usually confirmed until the results of serology are obtained. Early diagnosis based on the radiographic appearance would be helpful as the organism is sensitive only to erythromycin and tetracyclines. However, there is still debate as to the characteristic radiographic appearances of mycoplasma pneumonia, widespread nodular opacities being considered typical by some authors,4 5 while others stress the ocurrence of confluent consolidation.6 In view of these differing opinions, we have reviewed the radiographs of patients with proven mycoplasma pneumonia in order to determine the frequency of the various radiographic patterns that have been described. MethodsThe extent of the radiographic abnormalities in mycoplasma pneumonia, diagnosed over a fiveyear period, were reviewed by a physician and radiologist together. The 60 subjects consisted of 35 inpatients and 25 outpatients of whom 38 were male and 22 were female (table 1). The ages of the male and female patients were similar, (male mean age 31-9 years, range 12-45; female mean age 34'8 years, range 17-67).The diagnosis was established either by a fourfold rise in the complement fixing titre or an isolated titre of greater than one in 200 in the absence of positive serology to other organisms or

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