Pulmonary Fibrosis Symptoms

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Pulmonary Fibrosis

This page was written by Shelley Ensz, and has not yet been medically edited. See Disclaimer.

Overview of Pulmonary Fibrosis
Mortality and Prognosis
Symptoms

Disease Correlations
Diagnosis
Living with Pulmonary Fibrosis

Symptoms of Pulmonary Fibrosis

Symptoms of pulmonary fibrosis include shortness of breath (dyspnea) on exertion. In treating scleroderma, its best to identify pulmonary fibrosis before it is so advanced that it shows up on x-ray. That is why your doctor may order an echocardiogram, or other tests. (Also see Pulmonary Tests)

Chest Pain, Chronic Many different types of problems can cause discomfort, shortness of breath, pain with swallowing, and many other symptoms in the chest area. This chart may help you pinpoint your problem as you confirm your symptoms. familydoctor.org

Pulmonary Functional Abnormalities in Asymptomatic Patients with Systemic Sclerosis. Functional defects, mainly of the restrictive type, were observed in almost half of the asymptomatic patients with SSc. Pulmonary fibrosis and pulmonary hypertension are also findings in patients without clinical expression. Active detection of pulmonary involvement is recommended for all SSc patients. M. Nicola. AB0190 EULAR 2005. (Also see: Pulmonary Hypertension)

Shortness of Breath This worrisome symptom has many acute and chronic causes. Follow this flowchart for more information about the diseases in which shortness of breath occurs. familydoctor.org

Clinical and laboratory features of scleroderma patients developing skeletal myopathy. These findings suggested that the SSc patients with severe internal organ involvement, such as pulmonary fibrosis and heart disease, and some other complications were prone to develop skeletal myopathy during their clinical course of the disease. PubMed. Clin Rheumatol. 2004 Aug 20. (Also see: Skeletal Involvement and Cardiac Involvement)

Pleural effusion in interstitial lung disease. Pleural effusions occur in patients with various forms of interstitial lung disease. The effusions require a clinical evaluation to exclude complications of therapy and coexisting conditions unrelated to the underlying ILD. PubMed. Curr Opin Pulm Med. 2004 Sep;10(5):390-6. (Also see: Pleural Effusion)