When you mention someone with emphysema you might picture an older person, strapped to an oxygen tank as punishment for their years of heavy smoking. This is true in some cases, but what many people don’t know is that there is a gene for emphysema. This condition, called Alpha-1 Antitrypsin Deficiency, is a rare genetic ...
Emphysema is an incurable lung disease, usually brought about by the long term effects of smoking. It robs the people that have it of the ability to breathe easily, as it damages the air sacs in the lungs. Over the years, many famous people have succumbed to the effects of emphysema, such as Dean Martin ...
Anyone who has Asthma, or who is responsible for a child that has asthma knows how frightening it feels to feel like “you can’t catch your breath,” and in fact when someone is having an asthma attack breathing is very difficult. Inflammation and contraction of the muscles in the lungs cause spasms in the major ...
Emphysema Diagnosis: The Nightmare Begins My mother was diagnosed with emphysema in late 2002. I had worked in a hospital more than 20 years earlier and did not remember any emphysema patients surviving the disease. I made sure my mother took all of her medications and performed all of her nebulizer treatments yet, even in ...
Emphysema is one form of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) that is characterized by long term shortness of breath, severe shortness of breath on exertion, wheezing and sometimes coughing, when emphysema is accompanied by another form of COPD, which is bronchitis and asthma. When emphysema is advanced or is exacerbated by another chronic lung disease, ...
