What should I do if my phlegm leaves blood with spitting cough?

Coughing is one of the most common signs of respiratory diseases. The cause of its occurrence can be both local irritation of the receptors of the mucosa of the respiratory tract, and more general, for example, neurological.

Cough, which separates sputum from blood, is called haemoptysis. When a hemoptysis occurs, the patient should be carefully examined to establish the exact cause of this symptom of the disease.

Sputum with blood: causes of coughing with hemoptysis

First, it is necessary to detect the source of the origin of blood in the mucus to be separated. Expectoration with blood can be caused not only by respiratory disease, but also by damage from the gastrointestinal tract (GIT) or nasopharynx. After all, it is quite easy to confuse hemoptysis with blood vomiting. But the blood coming from the gastrointestinal tract, usually accompanied by painful sensations in the abdominal cavity, and also has a more intense dark color ("coffee grounds").

Most often, the patient coughs up blood with the following diseases:

- Inflammatory diseases. These may include bronchiectasis, bronchitis, lung abscess, tuberculosis;

- neoplasms of the lung: scaly-cell lung cancer, ovarian-cell carcinoma, adenocarcinoma and bronchial adenoma;

- other types of diseases, for example, PE, cardiac or pulmonary insufficiency, Wegener's granulomatosis , etc.

Most often, the cause of coughing with blood is bronchitis and bronchiectasis, but it should be noted that in about 10% of cases the cause of bleeding is not established in the patient.

Diagnosis of a cough with blood

If a person has sputum with blood, a knowledgeable specialist will definitely assign the following examinations to him:

- Chest X-ray. In the picture, you can see small dark areas that indicate the presence of inflammatory processes in the lungs, which can mean, for example, pulmonary embolism or lung cancer;

- bronchoscopy, which will help to notice any changes in the lumen of the bronchi, which, in turn, will help in diagnosing diseases such as bronchiectasis and lung cancer;

- CT scan. This is one of the most modern methods of research, which allows to reproduce in detail the lung tissue on the screen in order to find out the causes of the appearance of a cough containing phlegm with blood;

- bacterial sputum analysis. It allows you to diagnose possible infectious diseases, which result in sputum with blood. After all, for example, with such symptoms, tuberculosis, pneumonia or lung abscess is possible;

- general blood analysis. This blood test can reveal the presence of an inflammatory process in the patient's body, confirmation of this will be high rates of erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) and leukocytosis;

- coagulogram. This is a type of blood test that allows you to determine the clotting characteristics of the blood. If sputum with blood is the cause of a clotting disorder, it is possible that this symptom will be followed by fairly serious illnesses, such as a heart attack or stroke;

- Fibrogastroduodenoscopy. It is carried out in order to exclude the possibility of penetration of blood from the gastrointestinal tract of the patient. As already mentioned above, often patients confuse hemoptysis with vomiting, in which there is blood. In addition, blood from the enlarged veins of the stomach can also be expectorated by coughing.

Treatment of the disease

All the medicines that are given to the patient in the event that when he coughs up his sputum with blood, can be divided into the following groups:

- distractions,

- expectorants,

- antitussive drugs,

- emollient medications,

- drugs that dilute sputum.

It must be understood that there are situations in which in no case can you suppress coughing with blood. So, for example, this can not be done in the event that the cough causes blood from the bronchi. Treatment for hemoptysis should only take place under the supervision of a doctor.