Overview
Pneumonia is a clinical syndrome caused by multiple aetiologies causing symptoms such as fever, chill, rigors, sweating, pleuritic chest pain, dyspnoea, productive cough and hemoptysis. Commonly, there are two classifications of pneumonia that is community-acquired pneumonia and hospital-acquired pneumonia). Pneumonia contributes as one of the important cause of lower respiratory tract infection. There are several important investigations to be done if pneumonia is suspected such as full blood count, blood urea and serum electrolytes, chest x-ray, liver function test, arterial blood gas, blood culture, and sputum culture. The mainstay of treatment is antibiotics, oxygen, bed rest, fluids and chest physiotherapy. The severe complications are a septic shock, lung abscess, pleural effusions, and empyema. In people with chronic diseases, pneumococcal vaccines are available to prevent this disease.
