[Pulmonary toxicity due to amiodarone].

Two patients with coronary heart disease and previous myocardial infarction, treated with amiodarone for severe ventricular arrhythmias, developed pulmonary toxicity. The first developed pulmonary complications after 1 year of therapy at the maintenance dose of 300 mg/day, and the second after 4 months at 200 mg/day and 3 weeks at 400 mg/day. In the first patient, whose chest X-ray mainly showed interstitial infiltrates which resolved within more than 2 months after drug withdrawal, steroid therapy was administered. In the second patient, whose chest X-ray showed a pattern of pulmonary edema, the symptoms and signs resolved more rapidly after drug withdrawal and without steroid therapy. We suggest 2 distinct types of pulmonary toxicity in our patients. After withdrawal of amiodarone in the second patient the management of refractory ventricular arrhythmias was troublesome.