Editado por: Ana Ochagavía Calvo - Department of Intensive Care Medicine. Hospital Universitario de Bellvitge, L'Hospitalet de Llobregat (Barcelona), Spain
Última actualización: Noviembre 2025
Más datosA 77-year-old woman was admitted to the hematology department due to myelodysplastic syndrome and a pulmonary mass in the right upper lobe (RUL), pending identification following a transbronchial biopsy. The patient was admitted to the ICU due to life-threatening hemoptysis, requiring urgent intubation, and a fiberoptic bronchoscopy performed at bedside revealed the presence of a large clot in the carina. Although an arduous attempt was made to extract the clot using the fiberoptic scope forceps, it proved largely unsuccessful due to fragmentation into small pieces. Therefore, a cryoadhesion probe was inserted into the clot and frozen for 10 seconds, achieving complete extraction. The clot showed a full cast of the bronchial tree of the RUL, as seen in the Fig. 1.


