[Bronchial carcinoma associated with pulmonary osteoarthropathy (Marie-Bamberger)].

Hypertrophic pulmonary osteoarthropathy (HPO) is characterised by clubbed, or drumstick, fingers and a painful periostitis of the extremities, and occurs most frequently as paraneoplastic symptom in association with bronchial carcinoma. Much rarer are inflammatory pulmonary changes such as lung abscesses. Curative treatment of the underlying disease will always also alleviate the pain in the extremities. This article reports on a case of a bronchial carcinoma masked by a pulmonary abscess. Despite the treatment of the abscess the patient developed the typical pattern of signs and symptoms of hypertrophic pulmonary osteoarthropathy for the bronchial carcinoma which was identified only later and which had been masked by the abscess. Persistence of hypertrophic pulmonary osteoarthropathy in case of a successfully treated pulmonary abscess should, therefore, always be regarded as a possible pointer towards an undetected bronchial carcinoma.