Signs of pneumonia in adult symptoms

The first signs of pneumonia in children and adults

Pneumonia is a disease that has an infectious origin and is characterized by inflammation of the lung tissue in the event of provoking physical or chemical factors such as:

• Complications after viral diseases (influenza, ARVI), atypical bacteria (chlamydia, mycoplasma, legionella)
• Effects on the respiratory system of various chemical agents - poisonous fumes and gases (see. chlorine in household chemicals is hazardous to health)
• Radioactive radiation, to which infection is attached
• Allergic processes in the lungs - allergic cough, COPD, bronchial asthma
• Thermal factors - hypothermia or burns of the respiratory tract
• Inhalation of liquids, food or foreign bodies can cause aspiration pneumonia.

The cause of the development of pneumonia is the emergence of favorable conditions for the multiplication of various pathogenic bacteria in the lower respiratory tract. The original causative agent of pneumonia is the aspergillus mushroom, which was the culprit of the sudden and mysterious deaths of researchers of the Egyptian pyramids. Owners of domestic birds or lovers of urban pigeons can get chlamydial pneumonia.

For today, all pneumonia is divided into:

• out-of-hospital, arising under the influence of various infectious and non-infectious agents outside the walls of hospitals
• hospital, which cause hospital-acquired microbes, often very resistant to traditional antibiotic treatment.

The frequency of detection of various infectious agents in community-acquired pneumonia is presented in the table.

Causative agent	Average% detection
Streptococcus is the most frequent pathogen. Pneumonia caused by this pathogen is the leader in the frequency of death from pneumonia.	3, %
Mycoplasma - affects most children, young people.	1, %
Chlamydia - chlamydial pneumonia is typical for people of young and middle age.	1, %
Legionella - a rare pathogen, affects weakened people and is the leader after streptococcus in frequency deaths (contamination in rooms with artificial ventilation - shopping centers, airports)	, %
Hemophilus rod - causes pneumonia in patients with chronic bronchial and lung diseases, as well as in smokers.	, %
Enterobacteria are rare pathogens, affecting mainly patients with renal / hepatic, cardiac insufficiency, diabetes mellitus.	, %
Staphylococcus is a frequent pathogen of pneumonia in the elderly population, and complications in patients after the flu.	, %
Other pathogens	, %
The causative agent is not installed	3, %

When confirming the diagnosis, depending on the type of pathogen, the age of the patient, the presence of concomitant diseases, appropriate therapy is conducted, in severe cases, treatment should be performed in a hospital setting, with mild forms of inflammation, hospitalization of the patient is not necessary.

Characteristic first signs of pneumonia, the vastness of the inflammatory process, acute development and the risk of serious complications when untimely treatment - are the main reasons for the urgent circulation of the population for medical care. Currently, a fairly high level of development of medicine, improved diagnostic methods, as well as a huge list antibacterial drugs of a wide spectrum of action have considerably lowered a death rate from an inflammation of lungs (see. antibiotics for bronchitis).

Typical first signs of pneumonia in adults

The main symptom of the development of pneumonia is a cough, usually it is first dry, obtrusive and persistent. protivokashlevye, expectorants with a dry cough), but in rare cases cough at the beginning of the disease can be rare and not strong. Then, as the inflammation develops, the cough becomes pneumatic with pneumonia, with a discharge of mucopurulent sputum (yellow-green color).

Any catarrhal virus disease should not last more than 7 days, and a sharp deterioration after 4-7 days after the onset of an acute respiratory viral infection or influenza indicates the onset of an inflammatory process in the lower respiratory tract.

Body temperature can be very high up to 39-40C, and may remain low-grade 37.1-37.5C ​​(with atypical pneumonia). Therefore, even with a low body temperature, coughing, weakness and other signs of malaise, you should definitely consult a doctor. Caution should be a repeated temperature jump after a light gap during the course of a viral infection.

If the patient has a very high temperature, one of the signs of inflammation in the lungs is the inefficiency of antipyretic drugs.

Pain with deep breath and cough. The lung itself does not hurt, as it is devoid of pain receptors, but involvement in the pleura process gives a pronounced pain syndrome.

In addition to cold symptoms, the patient has dyspnea and pale skin.
General weakness, increased sweating, chills, decreased appetite are also characteristic for intoxication and the onset of the inflammatory process in the lungs.

If such symptoms appear either in the midst of a cold, or a few days after the improvement, these may be the first signs of pneumonia. The patient should immediately consult a doctor to undergo a complete examination:

• To pass blood tests - general and biochemical
• To make a roentgenography of a thorax, if necessary and a computer tomography
• Sputum for culture and sensitivity of the pathogen to antibiotics
• Sputum for culture and microscopic determination of mycobacterium tuberculosis

The main first signs of pneumonia in children

Symptoms of pneumonia in children have several characteristics. Attentive parents may suspect the development of pneumonia with the following discomforts in the child:

• Temperature

Body temperature above 38C, lasting for more than three days, not knocked down by antipyretic agents, may also not be a high temperature up to 37.5, especially in young children. At the same time, all signs of intoxication are manifested - weakness, increased sweating, lack of appetite. Small children (as well as elderly people), can not give high temperature fluctuations with pneumonia. This is due to imperfect thermoregulation and immaturity of the immune system.

• Breath

There is frequent shortness of breath: in children up to 2 months of age, 60 breaths per minute, up to 1 year, 50 breaths, after a year, 40 breaths per minute. Often the child spontaneously tries to lie down on one side. Parents can notice another sign of pneumonia in a child, if you undress a baby, then when you breathe from a sick lung you can notice the retraction of the skin in between the ribs and the lag in the process of breathing one side of the chest. There may be irregular breathing rhythm, with periodic stops of breathing, changes in the depth and frequency of breathing. In infants, shortness of breath is characterized by the fact that the child begins to nod his head in time with the breath, the baby can stretch his lips and inflate his cheeks, foamy discharge from the nose and mouth can appear.

• Atypical pneumonia

Inflammation of the lungs caused by mycoplasma and chlamydia differ in that first the disease passes like a cold, a dry cough appears, a runny nose, a sore throat, but the presence of dyspnea and a stably high temperature should alert parents to the development of pneumonia.

• Character of cough

Because of the perspiration in the throat, only coughing can appear first, then the cough becomes dry and painful, which is amplified by crying, feeding the baby. Later, the cough becomes wet.

• Behavior of the child

Children with pneumonia become whimsical, whiny, sluggish, they are disturbed by sleep, sometimes they can completely refuse to eat, and also appear diarrhea and vomiting, in infants - regurgitation and rejection of the breast.

• Blood test

In the general analysis of blood, changes are detected that indicate an acute inflammatory process - increased ESR, leukocytosis, neutrophilia. Shift of the leukoformula to the left with increasing stab and segmented leukocytes. In viral pneumonia, along with high ESR, there is an increase in leukocytes due to lymphocytes.

With timely access to a doctor, adequate therapy and proper care for a sick child or adult, pneumonia does not lead to serious complications. Therefore, at the slightest suspicion of pneumonia, the patient should be given medical care as soon as possible.

zdravotvet.ru

Symptoms of pneumonia in adults

Do not underestimate the common cold, because an untreated infection can lead to the development of pulmonary inflammation, i.e. pneumonia. This is a more serious disease, even fatal. Having found out signs of a pneumonia at the adult, the last it is necessary to address to the doctor. This is necessary because the inflammation can have not only a pronounced, but also a hidden character. The instructions below will help to recognize what pneumonia is and what symptoms it indicates.

The first symptoms of pneumonia in an adult

Pneumonia, depending on the type of pathogen and the nature of the flow is divided into several types:

• acute or chronic;
• virus;
• fungal;
• radical;
• croup or pleuropneumonia;
• bronchopneumonia;
• aspiration;
• bilateral or one-sided.

There are several types of pneumonia, but they have common symptoms:

1. Persistent cough. First dry, and with the development of the disease wet with pus and mucous sputum yellow-green hue.
2. The duration of the cold is more than a week. Viral disease not only does not pass, but is characterized by deterioration.
3. Repeated increase in body temperature after period of improvement.
4. Absence of a positive effect of antipyretic drugs.
5. Painful sensations when coughing in the chest and back, shortness of breath, pale skin.
6. General malaise, excessive sweating, lack of appetite.

Bronchopneumonia

A distinctive feature of bronchopneumonia is its foci, i.e. the disease affects many small areas of the pulmonary lobules. More often it occurs as a result of complications of bronchitis, when the virus descends lower in the respiratory system. A large number of lesions makes it difficult to diagnose and treat such a form of pneumonia, therefore it is characterized by frequent relapses. Signs of focal pneumonia in adult women and men look like this:

• chills, intense fever;
• cough dry, with abundant phlegm or even with bloody discharge;
• quickening of breathing;
• internal rales;
• increase in temperature up to 39 ° С;
• lack of appetite;
• pale skin;
• sleep disorders;
• cramps of the lower part of the legs;
• lack of air;
• pain with deep breath and cough.

Hidden pneumonia

Pneumonia of the lungs may not manifest symptoms. This is a particularly severe, latent form of infection caused by chlamydia or mycoplasmas, i.e. Atypical for common inflammation pathogens It is difficult to determine, because the nature of the course of the disease is often asymptomatic and sluggish, but doctors can notice signs of atypical pneumonia in an adult:

• intermittent breathing with whistles;
• the appearance of sweat on the forehead, even with minor loads;
• the blush on the cheeks stains;
• dyspnea;
• a constant thirst;
• increased heart rate;
• difficult breathing;
• general malaise;
• one half of the chest remains immobile during breathing.

Two-sided

What is the risk of bilateral pneumonia? The lesions are extensive and located in both lungs, which causes oxygen starvation of the body, because healthy departments can not cope. In addition, the following signs of viral pneumonia are noted:

• heat;
• weakness of the body, low appetite;
• lack of air;
• blanching of the skin;
• blue lips and fingertips;
• impaired consciousness;
• dry or wet cough;
• hard breath.

Grybkovoy

Another dangerous form of pneumonia is fungal. With her, too, there are difficulties in diagnosis, because the clinical picture is poorly due to the specificity of the fungus - the causative agent of the disease. This leads to the fact that the potential patient does not even know about his disease. A person can get infected while in a room where there is damp and there is mold.

First there are signs characteristic of usual pneumonia in the form of dyspnea, heavy breathing, malaise and high fever. Then they are joined by a cough with purulent discharge as a result of rupture of inflammations formed by microorganisms. Complications of pneumonia of the fungal form are more often presented in the form of pleurisy due to the ingress of pus into the pleural cavity.

Pleuropneumonia

This form of infectious disease is also called croupous. Pleuropneumonia often affects up to 2-3 lobes of the lung and necessarily draws into its process the membrane - the pleura. The following are the first symptoms of infection:

• the temperature rises to 40 ° C;
• there is a strong chill and a headache;
• when breathing, there is pain in the chest;
• breathing becomes superficial because of pain.

With the development of the eye the patient's eyes become shiny, the lips acquire a bright cherry color, a blush appears on the side of the pneumonia. Herpes sores can form on the neck. After the appearance of a cough, rusty sputum begins to disappear the next day, sometimes vomiting occurs. After another day, there is such shortness of breath that the patient is unable to rise even to the floor.

Aspiration

This kind of pneumonia develops when fluids get into the lungs, vomit or food. As you can see in the photo, the foreign body is determined by x-ray. The following features are distinguished by the aspiration form:

• cough with discharge of unpleasant smelling mucus with impurities of pus and blood;
• feverish condition;
• pain in the chest;
• constant shortness of breath;
• blue skin;
• increased sweating;
• difficulty in swallowing.

The main symptoms of pneumonia

Pneumonia is an insidious disease that can go on without pronounced symptoms. The danger is that a person connects the ailment with overstrain at work or with other factors, and therefore does not hurry to see a doctor. For this reason, complications often occur or the disease becomes chronic, which complicates both diagnosis and treatment.

Without temperature

The latent form of pneumonia in an adult without a cough and other characteristic symptoms is one of the most dangerous. The patient does not notice signs, and therefore delays with the necessary treatment. Symptoms of pneumonia in an adult without fever are presented in the following list:

• constant weakness and tendency to sleep;
• tired look with a painful blush;
• hard, wheezing;
• the appearance of dyspnea with light loads;
• violation of the heart rate, increased heart rate;
• increased sweating, especially at night;
• lack of normal appetite.

Chronic pneumonia

Any untreated disease flows into a chronic form. This also applies to pneumonia. When there is at least one focus of inflammation in the lungs, it can cause chronic pneumonia. Such a process is dangerous because it can lead to cardiovascular failure. Characteristic chronic signs of pneumonia in adults are as follows:

• hard breath;
• cough with phlegm, sometimes including pus;
• rapid pulse;
• dyspnea;
• general malaise of the body;
• lack of appetite;
• weight loss;
• during periods of relapse - cough, fever.

Video about the symptoms and treatment of pneumonia

Having found out at itself signs of a pneumonia, it is necessary to address immediately to the doctor. Only he will be able to determine the form, the nature of the course of the disease and will prescribe the right therapy. To know what changes in the body indicate pneumonia, look at the video below, from which you will understand both the symptoms and the treatment of pneumonia.

sovets.net

Symptoms and signs of pneumonia in adults

Is pneumonia dangerous for adults?

Pneumonia is an acute infectious disease that occurs with inflammation of the lung tissue. Inflammation of the lungs remains one of the leading causes of death from respiratory diseases, despite a giant leap in the development of medicine. Symptoms of pneumonia in adults, children and the elderly, as before, make doctors worry about the fate of patients.

In 2006, 591493 cases of pneumonia were detected in Russia, which was 3.44 ‰ for adults> 18 years. But these figures from official reports do not fully reflect the true picture. The calculations of scientists show that the real incidence of pneumonia in Russia reaches 15 ‰. The absolute number of cases of pneumonia is 1500000 people every year. According to statistics in 2006, pneumonia and its complications claimed the lives of 3, 70 Russian adults.

If elderly patients> 60 years of age have chronic concomitant pathology (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, cancer, alcoholism; diseases of the liver, kidneys, heart and blood vessels; diabetes), then in severe pneumonia, mortality increases to 30%. The highest mortality from pneumonia in Russia is registered in adult men of working age. Typical for Russians, the risk factor for the fatal outcome of pneumonia is later seeking medical help.

Signs that increase the risk of death from pneumonia in adults:

• Male.
• Severe hypothermia before the disease.
• Dyspnea with respiratory rate> 28 in 1 min.
• Violation of the mental state of the patient.
• Concomitant diseases - chronic heart failure, decreased immunity, diabetes, atherosclerosis of the heart vessels, oncological processes, chronic renal failure.
• Low blood pressure
• Low body temperature

If patients who died of pneumonia knew the first signs of a dangerous illness and turned to the doctor on time, their lives could be saved.

The first signs and symptoms, indicating an inflammation of the lungs:

• Suddenness of onset of the disease;
• fever (a sudden increase in body temperature> 38 ° C);
• chills (muscle trembling);
• chest pain when coughing and deep breathing;
• dry or unproductive cough with sputum rusty;
• shortness of breath - a feeling of lack of air;
• general weakness and fatigue;
• heavy sweats at night and at the slightest load.

These signs in a person who has fallen ill with a "cold" should alert his relatives, as he is quite likely to diagnose pneumonia. If you suspect an inflammation of the lungs, consult a doctor.

Objective signs of the disease

The doctor, examining the patient, reveals the objective symptoms of pneumonia:

• Dullness of sound when tapping over the affected places of the lungs;
• hard breathing over the inflamed part of the lung tissue;
• listening to wheezing over the site of inflammation.

The main rule that confirms pneumonia is the asymmetry of objective findings, that is, the presence of pneumonia symptoms in only one lung. After the examination, the doctor will prescribe an X-ray of the chest.

X-ray symptoms of pneumonia

The main radiographic evidence of pneumonia is local dimming of the lung in a patient who has symptoms of inflammation of the lower respiratory tract.

X-rays for suspected pneumonia are performed by all patients: children and adults. This mandatory rule is associated with the risk of complications of pneumonia with a delay in the appointment of antibiotics. The consequences of procrastination can be fatal.

Treatment of inflammation of the lungs

The main component of treatment, determining the prognosis, is the correct choice of antimicrobial agent - antibiotic. Treatment of mild cases of inflammation of the lungs in adults can be carried out at home. In addition to antimicrobial drugs, the patient needs a bed rest for the time of fever, abundant warm drink and adequate nutrition. If the patient coughs up phlegm, then cough can be alleviated with the help of expectorants and compresses on the chest.

Diet for a patient with pneumonia is in frequent fractional nutrition, the food should be easily assimilated and fully-fledged in composition.

In case of a serious condition, the patient is treated in a hospital (hospital).

After recovering from pneumonia, the patient is observed at the clinic therapist for 1 year.

Prevention of disease

To prevent the disease will help vaccinate against pneumococcus - the main culprit of the disease. If the vaccine is contraindicated to a patient at risk, you can use drugs such as "vaccine-tablets." Such drugs contain surface proteins of microbial pathogens that enhance immunity. The action of such immunomodulators is regarded as "grafting", only without injection. For a competent choice of treatment and prevention of pneumonia, a doctor's consultation is necessary.

ingalin.ru

Inflammation of the lungs in adults: symptoms, treatment

Inflammation of the lungs in adults is an acute lung injury. The cause of pneumonia (this is the name of this inflammatory process in medicine) is an infection that penetrates the body by airborne droplets. Initially, to determine whether a patient actually has a given severe inflammatory process, he is given a referral to the chest X-ray.

The prognosis for the positive outcome of this disease depends solely on what caused the inflammatory process, what measures were taken initially, and also - at what stage the patient turned to the doctor for help (that is, how much time has passed since the first signs of the disease appeared and before calling the doctor).

Epidemiology of pneumonia

To date, pneumonia is one of the most common infectious lesions of the human lungs. Every day, pneumonia affects about 15 people in the world. If you resort to statistics on mortality from pneumonia, of the 2 million people who have lung pneumonia, 4, 00 die.

Doctors call pneumonia a terrible disease that affects both young children and elderly people. Moreover, despite the development of medicine and the progress of scientific technologies, pneumonia (pneumonia) is a common and frequently occurring cause of death in all developing countries.

Lethal outcome of pneumonia

The death from pneumonia is increased exponentially. It is the leader in mortality among infections with infectious diseases. A list of diseases that most often leads to mortality is created. In the first place are cardiovascular lesions, then oncology and in third place - infectious pneumonia.

Among the reasons for the increased mortality of patients from pneumonia, it is necessary to indicate reduced immunity. It is against this background that most inflammatory and infectious processes develop, because the body does not have the physical strength to resist infection.

The first signs of pneumonia

As mentioned above, the form of manifestation of pneumonia depends entirely on the type of pathogen. Depending on the type of infectious process in the body, the first signs of pneumonia are isolated.

If pneumonia is diagnosed at the mild / first stage of the lesion, the chances of a positive outcome are quite high.

Among the first signs of the inflammatory process of the lungs can be identified such as:

• A heat that lasts for several days;
• Prolonged runny nose;
• Prolonged cough;
• Chills, a person is feverish, even despite the intake of antibiotics, and special antipyretic drugs;
• Shortness of breath while walking or a long conversation;
• A person may feel that he is suffocating and he does not have enough oxygen;
• Increased weakness in the body;
• Muscle weakness;
• Man gets tired very quickly.

Among all these signs, the first thing that should disturb a person is an acute, catastrophic lack of air. Indeed, it creates the feeling that something is strangling you, the rope is tightening around your neck. A person can make uncomfortable wheezing, he wants to clear his throat and start breathing freely.

At the first stage of pneumonia as such, the defeat of the upper respiratory tract may not be. But, it will progress with every day (without lack of treatment), and turn into a deadly phenomenon.

Diagnosis of pneumonia at an early stage

Diagnosis of pneumonia at an early stage of the disease can be done with a chest X-ray. At this stage, the first lesions of the pulmonary parenchyma are already visible. What if you have pneumonia?

If pneumonia is detected at an early stage, it is mandatory to start taking antibiotics in order to prevent pulmonary insufficiency.

Important!

With an increase in temperature, the appearance of chills, runny nose, attacks of suffocation, you can call an ambulance. But! If at an early stage to identify an acute pathological lesion of the lungs will not be possible. The physiological state of the patient must be monitored in dynamics. On the second, third day the patient begins to breathe heavily, and wheezing is heard in the lungs.

It is very important not to miss the moment of defeat of lung tissue. Otherwise it can be very late and the volume of allocated infiltrative foci will be deadly.

Definition of pneumonia of the lungs by specific features

Pneumonia in an adult has some specific characteristics, which necessarily need to pay attention.

• Since the virus that causes pneumonia affects the blood vessels of the lungs, the person as a result of this can get sick more than 3 times in one year (due to the fact that the lungs are overgrown with fibrous tissue or in simple words - tissue scarring occurs).
• In an adult, pneumonia most often develops against the background of influenza. After a specific sneezing, runny nose, severe headache, and increased fatigue, a cough begins with sputum and blood.
• Inflammation is characterized by a specific pain in the chest.

Signs of bilateral pneumonia

In order to recognize bilateral pneumonia, it is necessary to pay attention to such signs of damage to the body as:

• Blood veins after every attack of cough;
• The rise in temperature is very rapid, a feeling is created that a person burns;
• Severe rhinitis;
• Continuous debilitating cough;
• Pain in the pile, like after hitting the chest with your fist;
• A red face, an unblinking blush on his cheeks;
• Eruptions of herpes on the face, lips.

Treatment of pneumonia

The first drug that is used in the treatment of pneumonia is antibiotics. Further, the patient must necessarily endure the disease without getting out of bed; he was given a generous warm drink, as well as an easy balanced diet.

For the cough relief, special expectorants are used.

Self-treatment, without examining the doctor and prescribed prescription of therapeutic actions, is not permissible.

medportal.su

Symptoms of pneumonia of the lungs

Before discussing the symptoms of pneumonia, it is necessary to understand a little the nature of the disease and clarify the meaning of terms describing the inflammatory processes in the lungs.

The nature of the disease and its causes

Until the beginning of the 21st century, Soviet medicine extended the expanded interpretation of the term "pneumonia." It was used to describe any acute focal inflammation of the lung tissue regardless of the cause. In the Russian classification of the disease "acute pneumonia" there were isolated such forms as "pneumonia due to chemical effects and physical factors "," allergic pneumonia "," infectious-allergic pneumonia "and other options.

Currently, in accordance with international standards, the term "pneumonia" refers to acute infectious diseases of the pulmonary tissue of predominantly bacterial nature. It is characterized by a local (focal) lesion of the respiratory tissue of the lung with the swelling of the inflammatory fluid into the pulmonary vesicles. Symptoms of inflammation in the lung tissue are revealed when the patient is examined by a doctor and an x-ray examination of the chest organs. For inflammation of the lungs are characterized by: acute febrile reaction (fever) and severe intoxication.

Since this disease by definition is an acute infectious disease, the definition of "acute" before the word "pneumonia" in the diagnosis became redundant and out of use.

Is there a chronic pneumonia?

The term "chronic pneumonia" in modern medicine is also not used, as it lost a real clinical basis. "Chronic pneumonia" of the 20th century was divided into several diseases of different nature. Distinguish them was made possible by improving the methods of examination and the progress of medical science. Chronic inflammatory reaction in the pulmonary ways takes place with all these diseases, which have received separate names and special methods of treatment. The most common of these is chronic obstructive pulmonary disease - a constant companion of tobacco smokers. Chronic bacterial infection is also characteristic of bronchiectasis.

What external signs does pneumonia have?

The first symptoms of inflammation of the lungs, which tell patients:

• sudden onset of the disease;
• acute fever (fever> 38 ° C);
• tremendous chills;
• acute chest pain, worse with coughing and breathing;
• cough dry or unproductive;
• expectoration of a rusty color in a small amount;
• dyspnea;
• pronounced general weakness, fatigue;
• sweating at night and with minimal physical exertion.

The thought of pneumonia should occur when a combination of body temperature increases with complaints of coughing, sputum separation, dyspnea, chest pain. Also, patients with pneumonia, complain of unmotivated weakness, fatigue, increased sweating at night.

How to recognize the latent form of the disease?

Almost in all age categories - in children, adolescents and adults, inflammation of the lungs has a similar clinical picture. But it is possible and hidden, sluggish form of the disease. Symptoms such as chest pain with coughing, fever and other signs may not be present in weakened adolescents or adults.

The latent symptomatology of pneumonia can be observed in the elderly. In 25% of patients aged> 65 there is no increase in body temperature, and the disease can manifest as fatigue, weakness, nausea, lack of appetite, abdominal pain, impaired consciousness.

Objective signs of inflammation of the lungs

The next stage of diagnosis of the disease after questioning is examination of the patient, revealing the objective symptoms of pneumonia. These are signs of a disease that the doctor finds in the patient when examining, tapping the chest (percussion) and listening to the lungs (auscultation).

Classical objective symptoms are:

• Stupidity of percussion sound when tapping over inflamed areas of the lungs.
• Listening to hard breathing over a limited area of ​​the lung tissue at the site of inflammation.
• Local listening to sonorous small bubbling rales over the inflamed area of ​​the lung.

The main criterion that confirms pneumonia is the asymmetry of the lesion, that is, the presence of objective signs of inflammation of the lungs only on one side of the chest.

In almost 20% of cases, objective signs of pneumonia in patients may differ from the classical ones or absent. In these cases, latent symptoms can lead to diagnostic errors. Fortunately, in the arsenal of doctors there is a way to detect the inflammation of the lungs with the help of X-rays.

X-ray signs of pneumonia

The main x-ray symptom of pneumonia is a local compaction (infiltration) of lung tissue found in a patient with external signs of acute inflammation of the respiratory system.

The consolidation of the pulmonary tissue in pneumonia usually has a one-sided nature. Two-sided infiltration is rare. This symptom is more typical for swelling of the lungs, metastases of malignant tumors, systemic connective tissue diseases with respiratory organs.

An x-ray study with suspicion of pneumonia is conducted in all patients without exception: newborns, adolescents, adults, pregnant and lactating women, elderly people. This rule is associated with the danger of a diagnostic error, high mortality when delayed in prescribing antibiotics for patients with pneumonia.

Symptoms of viral pneumonia

Acute viral respiratory infection and pneumonia itself are various diseases. Viral infection, of course, is a leading risk factor for inflammation of the lungs. However, painful changes in the lung tissue caused by respiratory viruses should be clearly delimited from pneumonia. After all, the treatment of these conditions is fundamentally different. True microbial pneumonia is qualitatively different from that of lungs by viruses, which is characterized by bilateral infiltration along the way of the pulmonary vessels.

Viral infection, especially highly pathogenic influenza ("pork", "avian"), can occur in the form of bilateral lung damage with inflammation in the course of the pulmonary vessels. At laboratory confirmation of the presence of highly pathogenic influenza virus in the patient's sputum and the absence of other pathogens in it, the diagnosis of viral pneumonia is justified.

The first significant symptoms of viral influenza pneumonia are rapidly increasing dyspnoea, an increase in temperature body to very high figures (> 39 ° C), a painful cough with bloody frothy sputum, a sharp general weakness. Influenza pneumonia is a very dangerous condition requiring treatment in the intensive care unit.

What is croupous pneumonia?

The term "croup pneumonia" is a traditional name for pneumococcal pneumonia, which has all the classic symptoms of lung inflammation in its entirety. Croup pneumonia is practically the only of all forms of this disease, in which a preliminary diagnosis corresponds to an aetiological (pneumococcal infection).

Croupous pneumonia develops sharply, beginning with a tremendous chill and a swift rise in body temperature to 39-40 ° C. An early sign is the appearance of chest pain on the side of the lesion, which is sharply aggravated by deep inhalation or coughing. First, the cough is dry, then on the second or third day of the disease, rusty or brown sputum appears. Characteristic signs are reddening of the face, especially on the side of the lesion, frequent shallow breathing to 30 per minute and more. Croup pneumonia usually affects one lung (usually the right one) and can capture 1, 2 or 3 lobes.

Atypical pneumonia in adolescents

The term "atypical pneumonia" means the belonging of the causative agent to microbes, called "atypical flora". Atypical flora are intracellular infectious agents - mycoplasma, chlamydia, legionella. Inflammation of the lungs, caused by mycoplasmas, most often affects young people in organized collectives - military service personnel, students, children, adolescents (20-30% of all pneumonia). And, on the contrary, at patients of the senior ages atypical pneumonia is diagnosed extremely seldom.

Atypical mycoplasmal or chlamydial infection is accompanied by muscle and headaches, chills, symptoms of ARI. Hemoptysis and chest pain are uncharacteristic of pneumonia caused by atypical flora.

Treat such a disease as atypical pneumonia, special drugs - antibiotics from a group of new macrolides (josamycin, rovamycin, spiramycin, klatsid). These drugs are approved for use in children and adolescents and do not cause intestinal dysbiosis.

ingalin.ru

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