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INTRODUCTION: Pneumoconiosis is a lung disease that develops as a result of a tissue reaction thatoccurs with the accumulation of inorganic particles. Pathoclinical features may vary depending on thetype of inhaled particle. Today, fibrotic and nonfibrotic tissue reactions are well defined in somesubstances. For example, it is known that exposures such as silica, asbestos, beryllium and talc areassociated with fibrosis in the lung, while exposures such as iron, tin and barium sulfate causenonfibrogenic changes. However, the pathoclinic and radiological findings of some rare exposures suchas zirconium are not widely known yet.CASE PRESENTATION: A 52-year-old male patient was admitted to occupational medicine clinic withcomplaints of dyspnea for the past month. He did not complain of cough and sputum. He had no previoushistory of tuberculosis. He had 30 pack-years of smoking history. He had not smoked for a month. In hisfamily history, his father had a diagnosis of COPD. On physical examination, breath sounds weredecreased. He stated that he had been a dental technician for 28 years. Especially for the last 26 years,he had been working only in the design and production of zirconium infrastructure. He was levelingzirconium products with a micromotor for an average of 3 hours a day. In his thorax HRCT (highresolution computed tomography ) findings, calcific ovoid shaped mediastinal lymph nodes andprominent parenchymal emphysematism and fibrotic densities in the upper zones were observed. Hedid not accept invasive intervention due to the risk of morbidity (pneumothorax, hemorrhage etc.). Afterexcluding differential diagnoses, pneumoconiosis was considered in the case with exposure history,clinical and radiological findings.CONCLUSION: When the toxic effects of zirconium were examined in the literature, lung fibrosisfindings were shown in rat and hamster studies, and fibrosis and emphysematous changes weredescribed radiologically in individual case reports. Although smoking was an important confounder inour case, it was thought that the radiological findings would contribute to the current literature in thiscase whose zirconium exposure was clearly defined.Keywords: dental technician, pneumoconiosis, radiological findings, zirconium |
