What symptoms will pleural effusion cause

Clinically, the majority of patients suffering from pleural effusion are middle-aged women, and they often seek medical treatment due to symptoms such as frequent fatigue, chest pain, and chest tightness. In addition to the symptoms reported by the patient, some related examinations are needed to confirm the diagnosis of pleural effusion. In order to enable everyone to achieve early detection and early treatment, let us learn about some of the symptoms caused by pleural effusion.

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The incidence of pleural effusion is also very high, especially among middle-aged women. The most direct factors of this disease are heart failure, infection, heart damage, etc. Patients will experience symptoms of chest pain and chest tightness, which has a great impact on health.

(I) Symptoms of pleural effusion

What symptoms does pleural effusion cause?

1. Corresponding symptoms of the original underlying disease

There are many causes of pleural effusion, and pleural effusion is often accompanied by underlying diseases, including lung, pleural, cardiovascular, kidney, liver and systemic diseases. Therefore, careful inquiry of medical history and observation of patient symptoms are very important for diagnosing the cause of pleural effusion.

2. Symptoms caused by pleural effusion

A small amount of pleural effusion may cause no obvious symptoms or only chest pain, and the pain worsens with respiratory movement; when the pleural effusion is more than 300-500 ml, chest tightness or mild shortness of breath may be felt; as the pleural effusion increases, chest tightness and shortness of breath gradually increase; when there is a large amount of pleural effusion, dyspnea and palpitations may occur, but the chest pain will be relieved or disappear.

(II) Signs of pleural effusion

The signs of pleural effusion are related to the amount of pleural effusion. When there is a small amount of pleural effusion, there may be no obvious signs or only limited chest movement on the affected side due to chest pain, weakened thoracic breathing, and pleural friction sound and weakened breath sounds can be heard on the affected side; when there is a moderate or above amount of pleural effusion, there is dull percussion sound on the affected side, weakened breath sounds, and weakened tactile vocal fremitus; a large amount of pleural effusion may also be accompanied by displacement of the trachea to the healthy side.

(III) Western medicine treatment

The decision to initiate aggressive treatment depends on the severity of the respiratory symptoms caused by the malignant pleural effusion. If the patient has no respiratory symptoms or is in terminal stage, no specific local treatment is required. When the clinical situation is unclear, simple thoracentesis is appropriate. If the patient's respiratory symptoms do not improve after removing a certain amount of pleural effusion from the chest cavity, the patient's condition may be caused by an underlying lung disease, such as emphysema, primary or secondary lung cancer. In this case, topical treatment is also not appropriate.

Chemotherapy and radiation therapy to the tumor causing the pleural effusion can help eliminate the pleural effusion and improve respiratory symptoms. For pleural effusion caused by obstruction of lymphatic vessels by lymphoma, lung cancer and breast cancer, radiotherapy can remove the cause of the obstruction, restore and improve pleural effusion dynamics, with significant results. For life-threatening pleural effusions that affect respiratory dynamics, thoracentesis can help control symptoms until other effective treatments are found.