Hi all... My mom has been a bit depressed lately because she looked at an X-ray she took recently and it said this: PA and lateral views of the chest were obtained. Combination of: effects of left sided mastectomy and borderline diffuse COPD changes are constant. The lungs are clear, otherwise. No pleural abnormalities are discerned.The heart, mediastinum, and the pulmonary vasculature are within normal limits. The thoracic aorta is mildly tortuous and sclerotic. No lytic or blastic lesions of the bony thorax are found. --I'm studying to be an RN and I can translate this X-ray a little, but I'm wondering if anyone else here has had one similar to this and how you are dealing with it? My mom is also kind of upset that her other 2 X-rays in the past mentions emphysema but no one has ever mentioned it to her. Please help me understand. Thank you 
Go with your mother to see your GP and ask him to explain it to your mum in plain english not doctor speak. Not being a doctor I can't say what this all means but your GP has a duty of Care to you mum and is obliged to explain it all to her. Hope this is helpful xx Patsy43
Has she asked the person who did the x-ray or the doctor who referred her? There'd be more point to that than asking strangers on the net to interpet an x-ray.
I'm confused by the reference to emphysema: if no-one mentioned it to her how does she know past x-rays indicate that? If she does have emphysema it's important for her to learn to take responsibility for managing the condition: eg rehab, exercise, changing breathing methods.
Sounds like they do see some at least mild COPD and it's crazy that no one ever told her. Everything else is good and within normal limits. And she's had a mastectomy huh? Bless her heart. But I agree...take her or you can even call her Dr and have them explain in layman's terms to you. I also studied nursing so I can decipher a bit...enough to know what I told you. It sounds like she has maybe scar tissue or old trauma to her aorta but nothing that they are are alarmed about. Call her Dr and have the Dr talk to you or his nurse. It's your right...or at least her right. Let us know!!
Ladyjack51
Sounds like they do see some at least mild COPD and it's crazy that no one ever told her. Everything else is good and within normal limits. And she's had a mastectomy huh? Bless her heart. But I agree...take her or you can even call her Dr and have them explain in layman's terms to you. I also studied nursing so I can decipher a bit...enough to know what I told you. It sounds like she has maybe scar tissue or old trauma to her aorta but nothing that they are are alarmed about. Call her Dr and have the Dr talk to you or his nurse. It's your right...or at least her right. Let us know!!
Ladyjack51
Thanks, ladyjack51. I'd take her but she lives in Pennsylvania and I live in NM. I'd call her doc but I think it's that whole patient privacy and hipaa that they won't give me any info on her condition or any of it. 
She'll be going to the doc on Wednesday I believe so I'll keep updated here. I would've at least liked the doc to have told her about having borderline emphysema the first time they saw it, even though it wasn't a concern. sigh.
When she goes...tell her to tell them to add you as a proxy to your file and that they are allowed to speak to you about her condition at any time. This works...then you can call anytime you want to get some answers. Keep me posted.....ladyjack51
One more thought...have your mom write down the questions she/you have and she can ask them one by one or hand them to the nurse and ask her to write the answers by the time she has to leave...please. This works too and that way via phone u can help her with the questions before she goes and she can call you or skype/video chat maybe after? There are lots of ways you can be part of this...she just has to have permission in her file that they can speak with you.
If you mean "hype": in relation to patient privacy, it's not hype, it's about respect! Wd you be happy to have your doctor give your health information to someone else? I'm sure any doctor would do so if your mother consented to it
No, I meant HIPAA, the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. I'm well aware of patient privacy and that's what HIPAA is for. That's why I stated I can't just call and ask about my mom's medical records.
That sounds like a good idea! I totally forgot I can ask my mom to add me. Now just getting her to remember that is a different story, lol! I will def keep you posted. She's just been really depressed lately and no matter what I talk to her about, she seems OK, but I think after I hang up she's back to her funk. I hope the doc will give her more info.
Whoa Jude....she doesn't mean hype....she means exactly what she put...she's talking about HIPA laws that relate to patient privacy. Do you live in the States Jude ? If not, then I understand your confusion. But if you do live in the States...you have no reason to be so abrupt with her. I knew exactly what she was referring to......
Ladyjack51
If you know the time of her appt...call her while she is there and have her give the phone to the nurse so she can get permission and put it in her file. Or call the Dr office while she is there and tell them what you are wanting to do and they can get her to the phone and confirm it. You can get this done girl!!
As for Jude....she must live in the UK and maybe they don't have HIPA there. But even so....Jude has been known to be a bit abrupt at times....so I posted to her too...let's see what she says bc she was pretty sharp with you for no reason and we ain't having that on here! Lol...other than that, she tends to have pretty good info and tries to respond alot to people. So sorry for that.
Lol, it's been awhile since I've come on here for any type of advice/help and I felt like I just got jumped on. :P I know there's a difference with us and UK, even with doc reports! Quite confusing for me but I guess it's how it is. But anywho, ugh, my mom sees her family doc this Wednesday so I told her to write down a bunch of questions she wants to know and hand it to the nurse. I'll call her tmrw to see what time her appt is so maybe I CAN call while she's there. She's 2 hours ahead of me so I hope I'm not in class! But thanks girl, you're keepin me sane here lol.
Aawwww...no problem. I'm blessed to help you if I can. Keep me posted!!
Sorry I misunderstood, I've never heard of it, but wouldn't have mistaken it for a word instead of intials except for the way you wrote it
Oh lay off me, will you? Going to try & report me again, are you? Or are you now the "we" who runs this forum? I don't think so ...
I'm not in the USA or the UK, I'm in Australia and it wasn't written as initials or maybe I could've had an educated guess - it was written in lower case as a word and my reply wasn't to you anyway, and it wasn't abrupt, it just asked a sensible question in a clear way without any waffling around. So sorry about that (not) .......
I you feel jumped it wuld be better to address the "jumper" direct, rather than add fuel to ridiculous little fires started by people with a personal axe to grind in relation to me.
Yes I should've addressed you but I'm not on here to fight nor argue with anyone. I came here to look for advice and see if anyone else had any test results similar to my mom. The first comment you made in here was asking if my mom talked to the person that did the xray... No she didn't because usually an X-ray tech comes in and does the xray and you find out results later. You ask it's better to find that out better than asking a bunch of strangers on the Internet? True, but everyone has questions, no matter what they are, isn't that what these forums are for? For help and guidance, comfort?
She knows about the past 2 xrays showing borderline emphysema because she was finally able to go in her patient portal and read the last 2 xrays. No one has ever brought them up to her at all, most likely because she showed no symptoms to it until now.
My mother is 72yrs old; while that's not an excuse, she's not a health professional nor does she really know what to do when she feels certain ways. Sure it's important for her to take responsibility, and that's what's she's doing; going to a doc today to see what she can do about it. Unless you want me to come down hard on her like you are, she may not want my help anymore. Please don't comment here if you don't have anything comforting or helpful to me. I don't need someone coming down on me about why I'm here asking questions or what I should be doing. That's what we learn about first in healthcare, to have compassion and to understand our patients.
I'm not here to fight or argue or come down on hard on anyone and that's not what I was doing. I'm not here to comfort anyone either and how do I know what's going to be helpful or not? What I do try and do is pass on what I know from personal experience, which includes learning to take responsibility and ask questions of health workers who have the x-ray or other test results in front of them, which obviously forum contributors don't have.
My compassion for and empathy with others includes honesty: I do a lot of writing other than on this forum and I don't apologise for my writing style being to the point without waffle.
If I were being offensive the mod's would do something about it, it's not up to other contributors to decide or request that anyone else not post comments on here. However, ouot of common courtesy I'll try and remember not to reply to any of your future posts if that's your wish.
Oh by the way, your mum's age has nothing to do with anything: I'm nearly 68 and I can still stick up for myself when necessary - she's lucky you're there to support her in this, I do it completely by myself.