Spirometric and radiological evaluation of the remnant lung long after major pulmonary resection: can compensatory phenomena be recognized in clinical cases?

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It has been generally accepted that lungs cannot regenerate in mature human. After a major lung resection, however, mechanical stretch, shear stress, and a variety of growth factors are induced in the remnant lung, and those are known to be driving forces for compensatory lung growth in animal models. Radiologically estimated "Lung Weight" is focused on as a significant parameter to determine severity of ARDS that is calculated by lung volume and density. Therefore, we also utilized the concept of radiologic estimation of lung weight for evaluation of the compensation. Before clinical investigation, a rational of radiologic lung weight was validated in healthy volunteers. This result met our hypothesis that radiologic lung weight is constant at any respiratory phase. Hypertrophic change of the remnant lung was recognized in living lung donors and lung cancer patients who underwent more than a 10-subsegment resection.