Implementation of bronchoscopic conventional transbronchial needle aspiration service in a tertiary care chest hospital

Background Conventional transbronchial needle aspiration (C-TBNA) is a unique technique that allows the sampling tissue from beyond the endobronchial tree, such as enlarged lymph nodes, peribronchial, or submucosal lesions. However, it remains underutilized and even unavailable in many countries and centers around the world including Egypt. Objective This study aimed to implement bronchoscopic C-TBNA service in a tertiary care chest hospital with special emphasis on the diagnostic yield, complications encountered, and learning experience. Patients and methods This cohort study was conducted on 60 patients with bronchoscopic nonvisible extraluminal lesions who have sought bronchoscopic C-TBNA service at the Bronchoscopy Unit of both Ain Shams University Hospital and Giza Chest Hospital during the period from June 2016 to February 2018. Results The overall C-TBNA had a diagnostic yield of 88.3% in which 68.3% were malignant and 20% had sarcoidosis without serious complications recorded except for minor non-life-threatening bleeding in 21.7% of cases. After 6 months of C-TBNA learning experience, the diagnostic yield showed improvement in physicians without previous C-TBNA experience, but without reaching a statistical significance. Also, there were significant reduction in both duration and complications of C-TBNA. Conclusion Implementing C-TBNA service in a tertiary care chest hospital in bronchoscopically nonvisible extraluminal lesions seems to be a safe, easy technique with high diagnostic yield and its learning performance was able to be improved over time.