Inferior pulmonary ligament
Citation, DOI, disclosures and article data
At the time the article was created Henry Knipe had no recorded disclosures.
View Henry Knipe's current disclosuresAt the time the article was last revised Henry Knipe had the following disclosures:
- Integral Diagnostics, Shareholder (ongoing)
- Micro-X Ltd, Shareholder (ongoing)
These were assessed during peer review and were determined to not be relevant to the changes that were made.
View Henry Knipe's current disclosuresThe inferior pulmonary ligament (or just the pulmonary ligament) is a normal anatomical structure that is often seen on chest x-ray and CT chest.
On this page:
Gross anatomy
The inferior pulmonary ligament is a fused triangular-shaped sheet of parietal and visceral pleura that extends from the hilum to the dome of the hemidiaphragm. It extends from the mediastinum to the medial surface of the lower lobe and is extra-parenchymal to the lung. It exists to allow vascular enlargement of the hilar vessels in times of increased cardiac output.
Function
The function of the inferior pulmonary ligament is fixating the lower lobe to the paraesophageal mediastinum4.
Contents
inferior pulmonary vein (at the apex) 1
Radiographic features
CT
thin, linear and predominantly midline hyperdensity that arises inferiorly to the hilum on lung windows 3
most apparent at the level of the hemidiaphragm
twice as commonly seen on the left than the right; evident in ~50% of patients 2, 3
Differential diagnosis
References
- 1. Brant WE, Helms C. Fundamentals of Diagnostic Radiology. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. ISBN:1608319121. Read it at Google Books - Find it at Amazon
- 2. Rost RC, Proto AV. Inferior pulmonary ligament: computed tomographic appearance. Radiology. 1983;148 (2): 479-83. Pubmed citation
- 3. Cooper C, Moss AA, Buy JN et-al. CT appearance of the normal inferior pulmonary ligament. AJR Am J Roentgenol. 1983;141 (2): 237-40. doi:10.2214/ajr.141.2.237 - Pubmed citation
- 4. Andy Adam, Adrian K. Dixon, Cornelia Schaefer-Prokop et al. Grainger & Allison's Diagnostic Radiology, 2 Volume Set. (2020) ISBN: 9780702075247 - Google Books
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