Angiocardiopneumography

1) The pioneer work in visualizing the pulmonary vascular bed by angiopneumographic techniques is reviewed.

2) More satisfactory results are obtained by injection of the opaque medium into the external jugular veins than into the arm veins. This is true because the opaque substance passes more readily into the vena cava and thence into the chambers of the heart without being partially retained in the arm veins.

3) An apparatus consisting of a prism on which several x-ray cassettes can be mounted and which can be made to rotate under the examining table permits six or eight rapidly successive films to be made as the contrast medium is injected to visualize the pulmonary vascular bed.

4) Angiopneumography offers proof that many peculiar radiologic shadows of the hilar regions are the result of various positions of the pulmonary arteries rather than hilar adenopathy.

5) Parenchymal tuberculous lesions of the lungs can be demonstrated to have diminished vascularity in contrast to the lung fields in other inflammatory processes by angiopneumographic study.

6) Collapse of the lung is also associated with a diminution of the vascularity of that lung even in the absence of parenchymal tuberculosis. This may be a factor in the rapid amelioration of toxicity through collapse therapy in tuberculosis.

7) Exact circulation times between parts of the cardio-pulmonary circulatory system can be pictured graphically and measured through kymographic study of the chest using angiopneumocardiographic techniques.

8) Kymographic studies have demonstrated less circulation in the apical areas of the lung as compared with the rest of the lung fields. This difference may account for the tendency toward apical localization of tuberculosis.