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Doctors Concerned, Seeing Pulmonary Hypertension More Often
POSTED: 4:41 pm EST January 15,
2008
UPDATED: 4:54 pm EST January 15,
2008
The following is a transcript of a report by medical editor Marilyn Brooks that first aired Jan. 15, 2008, on WTAE Channel 4 Action News at 5 p.m.
Doctors are seeing more cases of a relatively rare lung disease called pulmonary hypertension, but they're not sure why.
The hike in admissions is big. It's up 50 percent in six years. A study found patients not only stay in longer, they're more expensive to treat. When left untreated, half die within three years.Experts want to up the recognition in hopes they can stem the physical and financial toll.Fred Reading looks healthy, but he's anything but. At 64, he has one of the worst lung diseases possible. Pulmonary hypertension was caused by too much resistance in the arteries that carry blood to the lungs from the right side of his heart."At that time, I was at home," he said. "There was times I literally was crawling on the floor. I couldn't get my breath."He complained, but his doctor in Erie missed the diagnosis. A second opinion saved his life.His heart's right side is larger than the left. Normally, the left is larger."The right heart is working so hard, the muscle of the right heart is thicker than normal," said Reading.From 1997 to 2005, a study by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality found admissions jumped more than 50 percent to 456,000. Experts blame heart and lung disease."In both those instances, as patients are living longer with various treatments, pulmonary hypertension eventually develops in many of those patients we are now seeing, which we didn't see 15 years ago," said Dr. Srinivas Murali.Experts said awareness, earlier diagnosis and five new medications might help cut the numbers.Reading wears a pump that delivers rimodulin every hour every day. It opens his veins and eases heart strain.The study found 70 percent of patients admitted had heart disease. Most of the others had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. Experts said physicians often stumble on pulmonary hypertension, but hope they'll start looking for it.
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Doctors are seeing more cases of a relatively rare lung disease called pulmonary hypertension, but they're not sure why.
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