Objective: To describe an unusual case of acute eosinophilic pneumonia (AEP
) associated with hemodynamic instability.
Design: Case report, clinical.
Settings: Tertiary care intensive care unit (ICU).
Patient A single patient admitted to the ICU.
Interventions: Intravenous corticosteroids.
Measurements and Main Results: Resolution of distributive shock and respira
tory failure.
Conclusions: AEP with respiratory failure was first reported in 1989 as a d
istinct clinical entity. Patients with this variant of eosinophilic lung di
sease develop acute hypoxemic respiratory failure with a rapid response to
treatment with corticosteroids. The characteristic feature of this syndrome
is a predominance of eosinophils found in bronchoalveolar lavage fluid and
lung biopsy. Despite the increasing number of reported cases, to our knowl
edge, distributive shock has not been reported as a feature of AEP. We repo
rt a unique case of AEP associated with shock and review the pertinent lite
rature.