الفهرس 
Anatomy and Radiological Anatomy of the ThoraxOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
The outbreak of COVID-19 has caused concerns globally. On 30 January WHO has declared it as a global health emergency.
Chest CT has a potential role in the diagnosis, detection of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). Besides the classical chest findings, parenchymal and extra parenchymal incidental findings were detected and defined as any finding in the report not related to the purpose of the scan.
Incidental findings on chest CT may represent normal findings, or abnormal findings, requiring no further evaluation, or they may be highly significant, requiring immediate treatment, However, incidental findings are of questionable clinical significance necessitating further evaluation via clinical correlation, follow-up, and additional testing.
The study included 500 patients (211 males and 289 females) who were diagnosed with Covid- 19 chest infection.
All patients underwent detailed history taking including symptoms and signs of COVID-19 and laboratory investigations for COVID-19.
Non-contrast Chest MDCT was done for all patients.
Findings for COVID-19 (Ground-glass opacities with or without consolidative changes, Atoll sign, Crazy-paving pattern, Peri-lobular fibrosis, Significant mediastinal or hilar lymph node enlargement).
The most common incidental findings were degenerative changes in 168 cases (33.6%) followed by coronary atherosclerosis in 92 cases (18.4%), lymphadenopathy in 81 cases (16.2%), pleural effusion in 46 cases (9.2%), renal cysts in 43 cases (8.6%), elastofibroma Dorsai in 32 cases (6.4%).The least frequent detected findings were adrenal calcification, adrenal myelolipoma,
Summary and Conclusion
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breast implant, hydatid cyst, hydropneumothorax, osteolytic lesion, porcelain GB in 1 case each (0.2%).
Regarding the classification of the incidental findings, minor findings were detected in 290 cases that represent the higher percentage of the included cases (58%) while major findings were reported in 210 cases (42%).
There were 101 cases (20.2%) with CORAD 3, 193 cases (38.6%) with CORAD 4 and 206 cases (41.2%) with CORAD 5.
There was a statistically significant difference in the severity of the incidental findings according to gender in the cases of the study (p= 0.005). There was higher prevalence of Minor incidental findings in female patients compared to male patients (63.3% versus 50.7%) respectively. While there was higher prevalence of major incidental findings in male patients compared to female patients (49.3% versus 36.7%) respectively.
There was a statistically significant difference in the severity of the incidental findings according to age groups in the cases of the study (p= 0.013). There was higher prevalence of major incidental findings in age group less than 20 years followed by old age (≥ 40 years) as compared to the adult age group who showed higher prevalence of minor findings.
There was no statistically significant difference in the severity of COVID-19 disease as classified by CORAD system according to severity of the incidental findings (p= 0.301).
Although the immediate goal of this study is to address the frequency and prevalence of incidental findings in COVID-19 screenings, Care should be taken to prevent “over-informing” patients regarding minor findings, inconsequential findings as multiple studies have suggested that it can lead to anxiety and trepidation in patients. Another problem that can occur is that over-reporting of incidental findings could lead to unnecessary invasive testing,
Summary and Conclusion
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radiation exposure, and unnecessary expenses. Keeping this in mind, research should be done to understand that potentially significant incidental findings are important to report and follow-up and which are not, we thus recommend CT chest to detect incidental findings in patients undergoing CT chest and their clinical importance.