[Clinically unsuspected bronchial carcinoma in selected autopsy material].

During the period from January 1967 until December 1976, 8,503 adults and children (former inhabitants of the town of Erfurt) have been autopsied at the Institute of Pathology of the Medical Academy of Erfurt. In 2,496 of these cases a notifiable malignant tumor has been autoptically. 383 of them (15.3%) had a malignant tumor of the trachea, bronchi, or lung (ICD 162); their proportion in the autopsy material of the town of Erfurt was 4.5%. Clinical and autoptical diagnoses were identical in 227 of 383 necropsied cases (59.3%). In 108 cases (28.2%) a malignant tumor has only been suspected, and in 48 cases (12.5%) the bronchial carcinoma was detected only at necropsy. The number of the clinically only suspected and of the clinically unknown bronchial carcinomas increases beyond the 6th decade of life. Their proportion in females is higher than in males. The bronchial carcinoma was the direct cause of death in 214 cases (55.9%). In 142 autopsied cases (37.1%) the neoplasm was the basic disease, and only in 29 cases (7.0%) the tumor was estimated as an accompanying disease.