At an isolated weather station in the central United States, a technician emerges from a small brick shed grasping a balloon. It's not just any birthday party balloon, mind you, but a massive, white sphere more than 5 feet (1.5 meters) in diameter.
Most frequently, the lung abscess arises as a complication of aspiration pneumonia caused by mouth anaerobes. The patients who develop lung abscess are predisposed to aspiration and commonly have periodontal disease.
An abscess is a collection of pus that has accumulated within a tissue because of an inflammatory process in response to either an infectious process or other foreign materials. It is a defensive reaction of the tissue to prevent the spread of infectious materials to other parts of the body.