Bismuth paste injection into the pleural cavity used to be a treatment for chronic empyema thoracis. This method, however, was long forgotten and scarcely practiced due to advanced surgical techniques and antibiotic therapy. We report a 50-year-old man with chronic empyema thoracis who was successfully treated with bismuth paste injection after a failed surgical decortication and a long-term chest drainage. This case highlights a trial of a 100-year-old method of bismuth paste injection which proved effective after standard measures had failed.
Copyright 2010 The Society of Thoracic Surgeons. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.