Brochitis refers to a buildup of "gunk" (nice scientific term
there...) in the lungs. This messes you up (short term) two ways:
a) it physically blocks transfer of oxygen and CO2 back and forth
b) it makes the lungs all gooey (another nice scientific term) keeping
them from opening up -- thus cutting down oxygen transfer even more.
oh, and
c) means a _lot_ more muscle effort to inhale and exhale. (Breathing
takes a lot of work. usually you don't realize it...) oh, and coughing
to try to clear your lungs made things even more sore
This reduction in oxygen and the additional muslce work is what gave
you chest pain, probably made you dizzy, etc.
The albuterol is a drug that helps open up the parts of your lungs
that are still ok, getting you an extra hit of oxygen from those
portions.
You should also be getting some stuff to treat the bronchitis
directly. If the crud is courtesy of an infection, then you'd get
antibiotics.
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dannyb@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]
[TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: Part two in this saga -- I was back
this morning, Thursday, for a followup visit. We used to have a very
good doctor, Dr. Charles Empson here in Independence who worked for
the Mercy Physicians Group (an independent operation affiliated with
but not controlled by the hospital of the same name) which is across
the street from the hospital. Dr. Empson (like all the guys in the
medical group) are admitted to practice at the hospital itself, of
course. My mother went to Empson for at least 30 years. Around the
year 1999, he quit taking on new patients and only dealt with his
existing patients; it was his intention to 'begin to retire'. His
very thick white hair and face makes him greatly resemble Albert
Einstein, IMO. People who went to MPG were told 'no more Empson, we
have to assign you now to whoever else', so I got back after my
Aneurysm and was assigned to Dr. Wilkins' case load instead.
Finally, at the start of 2006, Empson's case load got down to only a
few 'survivors' (my mother and a few other old ladies) since by
attrition others had all died, moved out of town, or whatever. New
comers were _not_ given to him any longer. So, Empson turned in his
resignation to MPG, and Dr. Wilkins was promoted to Vice President of
Mercy Hospital by Sisters of Mercy, the parent company. The case loads
were all shuffled around at MPG; several of us got left in limbo for a
month of so with a Dr. Naheem, a doctor from India in residency at
Columbia University Medical Center in New York City who spent a month
or so with us here while a permanent replacement was found, which
turned out to be a Doctor Watkins, who is supposed to now be our perm-
anent, full time replacement for Charles Empson.
Now I can see some quizzical looks from readers: _Why_ would a doctor
doing his residency in New York City or his successor, Watkins, choose
to come to Smallville, Kansas to continue his practice? But we here in
Smallville, Bumpkins though we may seem to be, were not naive enough
to take either of them without _thorough_ investigations into their
medical abilities and personal lifestyles, etc. When Mercy Hospital
and the MPG people were completely satisfied there were no hidden
secrets anywhere, these two men were both employed by MPG to attend to
us patients.
Yesterday, Wednesday, I was 'encouraged' -- to put it politely -- by
my keepers to go to the emergency room. When I got into ER and the
examining area, _who_ pops in the door but dear old Charles Empson.
"Charlie," I said (for after so long and in such a small town one does
not go by formalities such as 'Doctor', especially when the man also
takes reasonably good care of my mother), "they told me you were gone,
out of here for good, they put you out to pasture at the end of last
year."
"Ah," he said, "I did retire from MPG, but I just could not take the
idle time, so I applied over here at the hospital and the director of
the ER took me on part time, a few hours per week." Hmmm ... PAT]
danny burstein (dannyb@panix.com)