The story of Patricia
Hi everyone,
I was diagnosed with plastic bronchitis after a bronchoscopy to see what was happening in my lungs when coughing up these strange bronchial casts. A day after this procedure I was admitted to hospital with pneumonia that led to being in induced coma where another bronchoscopy found my lungs full of large casts and lymph fluid which caused the respiratory failure. After time on ECMO to allow lungs to recover and changes in treatment I started to recover. When I saw the respiratory consultant who I had seen in outpatients clinic, she commented “we weren’t expecting that, as I found out the diagnosis myself plus being the first person the doctors had seen with this disease, let alone discover how rare it is in adults.It was 14 weeks in hospital then home to continue recovering. I continue to have episodes of plastic bronchitis but not as extreme as the one after first bronchoscopy. The two consultants who did one or two bronchoscopies per day for nearly 4 weeks both are delighted I recovered and do not want to see the inside of my lungs again.
I am continuing to find out more about this disease but it is still a mystery why it has occurred but I am alive to share this with you all.