Respiratory Examination – Keeping it simple

We examined a patient with a respiratory condition. I was teaching some final year students and the emphasis was on keeping it simple.
The patient was an elderly lady who was seated in bed. As the students helped to get her into position they noticed that her mobility was poor and they noticed that her hands were deformed. At this point we thought that she had poor mobility due to rheumatoid arthritis and that the likelihood was the respiratory condition was associated with rheumatoid arthritis (we accepted that is could be a totally unrelated condition).
Examination of the head was unremarkable.
On examination of the hands, the nails were normal the skin was hyperpigmented (we could not account for hyperpigmentation).
There was swelling and ulnar deviation of the metacarpophalangeal joints and there was z deformity of the right thumb. No redness, non-tender
The interossei were wasted and there was bilateral wasting of the thenar eminence.
At this point we thought that the patient had inactive rheumatoid arthritis of the hands with disuse atrophy and carpal tunnel syndrome (the patient confirmed that she did have carpal tunnel syndrome)
At this point we thought of the complications of rheumatoid arthritis affecting the lung and what came to mind were pulmonary fibrosis, pleural effusions and rheumatoid nodules (we discounted rheumatoid nodules as being unlikely)
On examination of the trachea we noted that the trachea was deviated to the right.
We discussed the causes of tracheal deviation; conditions pushing it to the right or pulling it to the left. Out of the two conditions that we had in mind in relation to rheumatoid arthritis we thought that could be fibrosis on the right pulling the trachea or an effusion on the left pushing the trachea (fibrosis was unlikely as this is usually bilateral)
On examination of the chest we noted no abnormality in size or shape but respiratory movement was decreased on the left side of the chest.
This made us think that the patient must have a left sided pleural effusion.
We completed examination of the lungs and noted decreased percussion note (dull) with decreased breath sounds and decreased vocal resonance at the left base.
Diagnosis: left sided pleural effusion due to rheumatoid disease
We had not accounted for the pigmentation of her skin but as she had rheumatoid arthritis we thought that one of the drugs she would be taking could be the culprit. She was on methotrexate. We looked up the formulary and sure enough one of the adverse effects of methotrexate was photosensitivity.