Long-standing undiagnosed foreign body aspiration with concomitant pulmonary tuberculosis in an Immunocompetent man

Abstract

Foreign body aspiration is a rare clinical finding in adults, among which very few are reported, probably due to absence of classical clinical features in adults when compared to children and due to lack of awareness. We present a 57-year-old with chronic productive cough who was diagnosed to have pulmonary tuberculosis (TB), complicated by long-standing foreign body in the tracheobronchial tree. There are many cases reported in literature where there have been misdiagnosis with respect to pulmonary TB as foreign body or foreign bodies as pulmonary TB. However, this is the first case where retained foreign body and pulmonary TB coexisted in a patient.