Sprirometry Test made me worse

Chest and lungs
1

Hi all,

For a while I've been having breathing problems, I have had adult onset asthma for many years and thought it might just be getting worse. I had a spirometry test (which my nurse has been avoiding for a while) on Tuesday just gone and my breathing was ok before the test. This test was horrible and I couldn't breathe out long enough without terrible straining as the nurse kept saying keep going, keep going. She diagnosed severe COPD and I've been given Spireva and that was it, no referrals anywhere else or any help with anything. Since coming home after the test I couldn't breathe properly and am still like this, with pounding headache and feeling faint. I went back yesterday and the nurse said I was hyperventilating which is not true as I don't let myself get like that as I will just keel over, so her attitude is not helpful. The GP came in and said he wanted me to see a thoracic specialist and I have an appointment in May to see them but I also have thickened mucosal linings in my sinuses and they are heavily inflamed so nose breathing is difficult and I'm waiting to see an ENT doctor for solutions. Spireva is like;ly to make me worse as I react badly to a lot of medicines with throat swelling, facial blisters and breathing made worse so I'm reluctant to move on to the Spireva - my nurse just poo poohed the idea that i'd react despite knowing my history of drug reactions. My main question though is have I just inflamed all my chest area because of the spirometry and is it likely to settle down, if so, how long or has the test damaged my chest beyond repair as I definitely was not this bad before the test. I have never smoked (except passively as a child due to chain smoking parents)and I'm a 47 year old female who also has scoliosis so my ribcage is twisted too. I can't believe this test has made me so unswell and all the things I had planned for this wek have had to be cancelled because I feel so unwell. My practice nurse also said the test said I had the lungs of a 140 year old, f so surely I would be dead. Can anyone advise please?

2

Hi,

I have had two spirometry tests over the past 10 years. Each time I have felt ill. After the first one my breathing was so bad I was laid up for over a week. When I had the second one I was in hospital at the time so was able to rest in there. I think that test does put severe strain on our lungs and makes our chests sore. Hopefully it will ease up as the days go on.

At least you have an appointment to see a thoracic specialist who should be able to sort things out for you.

It is a shame that the nurse is not more understanding.

Keep us informed on how you get on.

Tessa

3

recently experianced something similar, turns out spiriva inhaler that i started taking about march is the problem, it gave me a throat infection,lost my voice too, had thrush in vocal chords, just 3 days into treatment i have my voice back, and if i hadnt read the side effects leaflet myself nothing would have been done about it,ive been suffering from taking this from the start.

doctor said i was looking for other things to blame,becuase i still smoke, trying to quit but not finding it easy at all.

4

Hi, I have similar experience with steroids, actualy I have most of the side affects caused by steroids. Often argue with doctors that, perhaps height/weight should be taken into consideration before prescribing dosage! After all Vet do with animals? Maybe you could get Spriva at a lower dosage? worth asking eh? :? :? :?

5

That is good advice Anna. It is always worth going back to your doctor and discussing the problem again and putting your theory to him. That maybe a lower dose would help.

It is not easy to quit smoking but it can be done. The medication then has a better chance of working, so don't stop trying to quit, you will get there in the end.

Tessa

6

To the person who continues to smoke,,,,,,

Sorry, that is really asking for trouble.

To stand in a storm and try to take a pee, the wind will blow it all over you (the pee) it is juasrt absolutely eesential if you want to at least give yourself a chance, though not to recover your damaged lungs, at least ensure that you do not damage them even more, by and through smoking, you will definitely be on the right road in order to damage your lungs even more, and the medicine, well, it is not a cure anyhow but then by smoking it is even less effective than it already is because the problem with lung disorders like COPD, the alveoli cannot be repaired yet, not until a medicine is invented that can do that. Medicine is relief not cure, as far as COPD is concerned.

I have COPD and I stoped immediately, I knew I had to, if I want to have a chance at survival, meaning, hold onto my life.

So, instead of getting rid of all tobacco I kept it right there where I could get it, but the psychological trick was and most certainly is, to say to yourself okay, I will keep the cigarettes here otherwise I'll crawl up the wall thinking how I have none but, I will decide simply not to use or smoke it.

And this is the way, I was able to stop smoking, after being so hooked on it, since childhood that I never evr hada single day as an adult that I had not smoked, my entire life revolved around smoke, from waking up to going to bed, I had cigarettes right thee in my bedroom, everywhere I went I lit up to break the ice, but, it never did make me more relaxed that is all in the mind, now that I do not smoke I've never been so relaxed.

If you try quitting and get rid of all of the ciigarettes it'll drive you nuts thinking about how you have none at home, so you have to decide to stop smoking have the cigarettes right there but from and through knowing it is killing you and that you must stop, you must stop using it, if you programme your mind, it will overtake everything else, I was amazed how easily I was able to stop after perhaps 40 years of smoking.

How sad that I smoked and didn't give my child lungs a chance let alone the rest of my body and mind, to develop, now I feel I love myself in a way that I never did, simply because our lungs are not built to be used to smoke, when we do smoke we are saying, I hate myself, I do not love me, because smoking is hurting me, if I loved me I would never purposely hurt myself.

But nicotine will tell us otherwise, it will say, you need me, you should not try to stop because you will not succeed, do'nt try, you can't get off, I make you feel good, you like me, I'm tasty, I calm your nerves.

But nicotine makes you into a nervous, selfish wreck, because smoking affects everyone else, we are not Humphrey Bogart and after all he died of lung cancer too.

It's the mind, the mind-set, put it right, and be free, of the disease which is the habit of smoking, it's a mental disease, to think it is okay, is a lie.

How it is disease is the power it has on minds and over minds to tell them, this is okay, it's nice, it's okay, a person feels when smoking good for the simple reason tha the craving and addition is seen to, the fix is made, just like the heroin addict. In fact my opinion is that smoking is worse than heroin addiction.

I have known heroin addicts they were able to get off of heroin, some were, but cigarettes, never, because they thought too the heroin was already such a big deal so smoking is nothing, whilst smoking is equally as bad.

Heroin may ruin a liver, but smoking ruins at least as much.

When the core of a human being, which is not only the heart and mind but the lungs - the apparatus that makes the rest possible the only thing that cannot be done without, along with the heart - is ruined, then in chain effect, so much more can come to be damaged.

The lack of oxygen in the blood and the imbalance when the lungs cannot expel the used gasses we breathe in and transfo