NEW YORK (Reuters Health) July 11 – Lung ultrasound (LUS) has been used in the diagnosis and follow-up of community-acquired pneumonia (CAP), according to a new report. According to Dr. Angela Reissig, “Lung ultrasound provides a number of different bases for the disease, especially when it is not possible to use (bedside ultrasound, emergency ward or GP operation) or when a chest X-ray is not suitable (endorsement: pregnant women, infants, etc.).” Jena Friedrich? Dr. Reissig of Schiller University stated in an email that “in cases with an ultrasound basis for pneumonia, the diagnosis can be established and treatment started immediately.” Together with her fellow researchers, she examined the accuracy of utilizing LUS to diagnose CAP as compared with bipositional chest X-rays and rows of low-dose CTs with negative or suspicious X-ray results. In this study, 362 patients with clinically suspicious CAP were selected to undergo LUS and chest X-ray. 63 patients underwent low-dose CT. Of the 226 patients with confirmed CAP, LUS correctly diagnosed 211 with a sensitivity of 93.4%. 127 of the 130 non-CAP patients lacked ultrasound signs of pneumonia with a specificity of 97.7%. Compared with LUS for the diagnosis of CAP, chest X-ray alone had a slightly lower sensitivity (199 of 215 cases detected, with a sensitivity of 92.6%) and a slightly higher specificity (all 122 cases detected, with a specificity of 100%). Twenty-six patients with CAP diagnosed by LUS had normal or suspicious x-ray findings, whereas 14 patients with x-ray-detected CAP had normal ultrasound findings. Ultrasonography has also been shown to be useful in documenting remission, with concordant results in 85 patients examined by LUS and 85 patients examined by x-ray at follow-up. “Approximately 8% of pneumonia lesions were undetected by LUS,” the researchers wrote, “therefore, pneumonia cannot be ruled out in the absence of significant ultrasound findings.” “Our study demonstrates that the use of LUS for the diagnosis and follow-up of CAP is feasible with very good sensitivity and specificity (at least when compared with duplex X-rays),” Dr. Reissig concluded.