A 40-year-old woman with leukemia is treated with chemotherapy. During treatment she develops increasing cough and shoness of breath. A chest X-ray shows diffuse lung infiltrates. Sputum cultures are negative and the patient does not respond to routine antibiotic therapy. An open lung biopsy is diagnosed by the pathologist as viral pneumonia. Which of the following histopathologic findings would be expected in the lungs of this patient?
Viral infections of the pulmonary parenchyma produce diffuse alveolar damage (DAD) and interstitial pneumonia. Necrosis of type I pneumocytes and the formation of hyaline membranes result in an appearance that is indistinguishable from DAD in other settings. The other choices are not characteristic of interstitial pneumonia.Fibrous scarring of lung parenchyma may be a late complication of some forms of this disorder.
Clusters of epithelioid macrophages
Confluent areas of caseous necrosis
Fibrous scarring of lung parenchyma
Hyaline membranes and interstitial inflammation
Infectious Lung Disease: Pneumonia