Re-occurring pleural effusion
Posted , 4 users are following.
In March is was diagnosed with a large pleural effusion in my right lung. Ended up in hospital and had 2 thorocentesis done. They took over 2 liters out. 2 weeks later the fluid was still there and they did a 3rd thorocentesis. took another 675cc out. 2 weeks after that I had a follow up and the fluid is builidng up again. No cancer, no tb, no organ failure, no funcus, no bacteria. Best my docots can figure (I've had a second opinoin too) is that I had pneumonia in Feb and it was treated properly (I was sick, the walk-in clinic told me I was fine). Meeting with surgeon next week to discuss options. Pulmonologist wants me to have a talc pleurodesis. I'm 37. Anyone else have experience with this? What is long term outcome? What is recovery like?
0 likes, 3 replies
ben89043 sarah197810
Posted
Hi,
Hope you are back to full fitness, I've recently had a similar situation I'm out of hospital after 2 weeks, however mine was diagnosed as bacterial pneumonia (no specific bug) I've had a 2 week follow up X Ray and come back fine. I'm still tight chested and generally achey. How did things pan out after this?
Regards,
Ben
yvona66968 sarah197810
Posted
This was 12 months ago so i'm curious how you've made out since. I had something similar - started with a bad cold, went to a cough, no fever... then i couldn't breathe... they drained 2 1/2 liters from my pleura... the fluid kept building up so they did a thoracotomy (sp?) surgery where they put talc in between layers of pleura, took pictures, too tissue for biopsy - thank God, came back clean, no cancer - for the past 2 weeks i'm walking around with a tube coming out of my chest draiinng fluid, have to empty a couple times each day, they will take it out when i am producing less than 100 ml... no known cause, probably a viral walking pneumonia... The tube in my chest is painful and uncomfortable, can't wait for this to end so i can get rid of it... wish they could figure out a cause.
yvona66968 sarah197810
Posted
Sarah,
Make sure they don't just look at your chest but they should do a CAT scan of your belly area. I had the same thing. They told me the same thing, that i probably had a viral pneumonia. And i did have the talc pleurodesis, it did not help. Now i know that a very large ovarian cyst was what caused all this, they removed it 12 days ago and i'm beginning to feel much better. The problem was for a whole month they just kept looking at my chest and lungs and no one looked any farther!