Let me make an analogy: we have all used pens, and the more the rubber sleeve is squeezed, the more ink is sucked in and the more ink is squeezed out.
If the pipe in the pen is blocked, ink cannot be sucked or discharged. The same is true of chronic respiratory diseases. If there is a problem, there are only two reasons, either airway inflammation, which leads to partial cilia lodging and airway obstruction, or alveolar inelastic.
What are the symptoms of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease? Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is a chronic disease with a long course. The main symptoms are chronic cough, expectoration and dyspnea, and dyspnea is aggravated after exercise, which is called exertional dyspnea and is a characteristic symptom of COPD. If the patient has the above symptoms under no other special circumstances, he should be vigilant, and may be accompanied by general symptoms such as fatigue, loss of appetite and emaciation.
The most common symptoms of COPD are long-term cough, expectoration, cough and dyspnea. According to the different symptoms of COPD, there will be different degrees of dyspnea. Patients with mild symptoms will be active or have obvious wheezing and dyspnea. Patients who are slightly heavier will have severe dyspnea after walking or climbing stairs, and more seriously, they will have dyspnea when lying on their backs. The most common complication of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease is cor pulmonale, and patients will have sitting breathing at night.
How to diagnose chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and what tests need to be done? 1. During visual inspection and palpation, the anteroposterior diameter of the thorax is increased, and the inferior sternal angle under xiphoid process is widened (barrel chest). Some patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease have shallow breathing and increased frequency. In severe cases, they may have contracted lips to breathe. Tactile speech tremor is weakened.
2. When the doctor knocks, the patient's lungs have unvoiced sounds, the boundary of heart dullness narrows, and the boundary of lower lung and liver dullness decreases.
3. Through auscultation, the doctor will find that the breathing sounds in both lungs are weakened and the exhalation is prolonged. Some patients can smell dry rales and/or wet rales.
Of course, generally speaking, if you want to judge whether there is COPD, you need to do the following tests:
First, check the respiratory function. Respiratory function examination can diagnose emphysema, which is of decisive significance to the diagnosis of emphysema. That is to say, respiratory function examination is necessary to go to the hospital to check COPD.
Second, X-ray examination. X-ray examination can check whether there is anything wrong with the chest, that is, whether there is emphysema or bullae.
Third, blood gas analysis. If there is hypoxia or carbon dioxide retention, the arterial oxygen partial pressure will decrease and the carbon dioxide partial pressure will increase. As soon as possible, if it is serious, there may be a decrease in ph or respiratory acidosis.
Fourth, the inspection of pathogenic microorganisms. Recurrent respiratory tract infection is one of the main factors that aggravate chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Therefore, when respiratory tract infection occurs, it is necessary to do blood routine, sputum culture and drug sensitivity test when patients cough up sputum, and to find out the pathogenic bacteria in order to guide clinicians to give correct treatment.