A rare case of thoracic brucellosis misdiagnosed as malignant tumor and literature review

Abstract

Brucellosis remains a major public health problem worldwide. It is commonly found in most developed and developing countries, such as the Mediterranean region, the Middle East, and Latin America. In China, brucellosis is mainly distributed in some of the northern provinces and is relatively rare in Shandong province. Brucellosis has a variety of clinical manifestations, with fever, sweating, fatigue, and migratory joint pain being the most common. Because of the non-specific clinical symptoms, brucellosis is often misdiagnosed as other diseases. Here, we report a rare case of brucellosis of thoracic vertebrae misdiagnosed as thoracic malignant tumor and present a review of related literature.