Changes in Bronchial Epithelium in Relation to Sex, Age, Residence, Smoking and Pneumonia

Abstract

IN previous investigations, we found a high degree of relation between cigarette smoking and certain changes in the bronchial epithelium of men who had died of causes other than lung cancer.1 2 3 These changes included hyperplasia, loss of cilia, metaplasia and the occurrence of cells with atypical nuclei. What impressed us most was the finding of many lesions composed entirely of cells with atypical nuclei in the bronchial epithelium of cigarette smokers, the number of such lesions increasing with amount of smoking. No such lesions were found in nonsmokers.3 Findings (other than invasive carcinoma) in the bronchial epithelium of men who . . .