Chest computed-tomography 1 day before the diagnosis of coronavirus disease 2019.

Abstract

A 63-year-old man presented for the further examination of chest radiographic abnormality to exclude lung cancer on November 14, 2022. For annual screening of lung cancer, he had visited another division of our hospital on October 21, 2022. A nodule with irregular margins was pointed out by the low-dose chest computed-tomography (CT) (Figure 1(a)). He had flu-like symptoms with a fever of 39.0° after returning home, then he had been diagnosed coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) by polymerase chain reaction test on October 22, 2022. After 10 days isolation and his symptom recovery, he visited us on November 14, 2022. Chest CT performed on the same day revealed small ground-glass opacity (GGO), which seemed to be in recovery phase (Figure 1(b)). We diagnosed the series of radiological findings as the pneumonia caused by COVID-19 infection. Although bilateral GGO and consolidation were reported as the predominant imaging characteristics in COVID-19, chest CT manifestations can vary in different patients and stages.1 This case is interesting, since the radiological findings of COVID-19 might have the possibility to mimic those of lung cancer. Clinicians should be aware of this characteristic radiological manifestation especially in case of early stage and mild COVID-19. All authors have contributed significantly, and that all authors are in agreement with the content of the manuscript: Conception/Design: Hiromichi Yamane and Nagio Takigawa; Collection of data: Nobuaki Ochi and Yasunari Nagasaki; Data analysis and interpretation: all authors; Manuscript writing: all authors; Final approval of manuscript: all authors. We thank Ms. Miki Nomura, a medical secretary of Sumitomo-Besshi Hospital Cancer Center, for her great effort on the clinical data collection. All authors listed on this manuscript have no conflicts of interest concerning this study.