r/pneumothorax

Title says it all, but for details - I had an empyema that grew in my plural cavity and crushed the bottom fifth of my right lung. Wound up in the hospital for 10 days after surgery. Been a while since then, and I feel good! No pain or anything. Just curious about if smoking weed after this is a good idea or not. I'm not a regular smoker by any means, and I never have been, but I'll be going on a trip soon and wanted to smoke with my friends. Any one have any advice?

I get the most horrendous jolting shock nerve pain from my lower left abdomen up to my neck. I’m one week out. I’m nervous of it not resolving over time. Just looking to hear experiences to help calm myself. I already had to have two nerve blocks over the last month in hospital and the most recent one is beginning to wear off and my god the shocks are unbearable :(

I’m interested to know any info on why the surgery fails sometimes? My Son hasn’t had his surgery yet but I’m curious to hear anyone’s thoughts or stories
edit**
Just for clarification, my son will be having the blebs removed then the mechanical pleurodesis, he is suspected to have a connective tissue disorder which is being investigated currently, all I know so far is what the surgeon has explained but I am interested in hearing others experiences 🙂

I had surgery in July and I'm supposed to go to Disneyland for two days in October.

Does anyone have experience going to an amusement park relatively soon after surgery? The nurse said it would be fine (including rollercoasters and drop rides) but I don't entirely trust her.

I’m day 6 post surgery. Doctors want me to start alternating between Tylenol and Advil. I’m concerned because of the anti inflammatory effects of Advil (they were the ones telling me not to use Advil but when I complained about still having a lot of pain and constipation they’re worried I’m still taking so much oxycodone and want to wean me off it, which I understand, but I don’t want to risk my surgery failing as a result..)

Asking for experiences with using NSAIDs after surgery and if so how soon and do you think it had and effect on your adhesions?

ETA: forgot to mention Tylenol doesn’t work on me so I need to take something along side it for pain control

5 days out from surgery and so frustrated. I spent a month in hospital after a failed mechanical pleurodesis just to end up with a tension collapse and then went back in for talc and mechanical. The whole 3 weeks beforehand I had an extremely painful chest tube that hurt so bad

Ever since surgery I just have the worst nerve pain all the time. But the worst is when I sit down- sometimes I get the most intense shocking pain in my lower abdomen that’s blinding and has me collapsing on the floor. PLEASE tell me this doesn’t last forever???

4 days out from my VATS re-do with talc and mechanical (mechanical failed a month ago)

Honestly still feel like total crap and still taking heavy painkillers but then again I am sensitive to pain. The worst is that I love fizzy drinks but can’t have them right now because the hiccups and burps give me the most horrible pain. When does it start to get better? I miss my La Croixs lol

On wednesday I awoke to a pain in my lower back that made it difficult to sleep. By end of day, it was painful to take deep breaths with my right lung so I went to the ER.

After a bunch of tests they determined via CT scan that I had bilateral pulmonary emboli. I started on Apixaban immediately and will be going to a Thrombosis clinic on Aug 26th.
The first night was painful to sleep, but now I actually feel pretty good and my lung does not really hurt anymore.

I am 49, very active/healthy, and had no known provocations for the clots. A few days prior, my left calf muscle had been sore (feeling a bit like cramp). There were no other signs (no swelling, redness) but I do wonder if that may have been a leg clot that eventually moved into my lung? About a month earlier I had twisted my left leg in a weird way on a chairlift and so that is the only thing I can think of that may have possibly caused an injury.

I live in North Vancouver and mountain bike almost daily. I am pretty devastated because I will not be allowed to bike for at least the next three months while I am on Apixaban.
What I really fear, though, is that since there was not really a clear provocation, I may be doomed to permanent anticoagulants, which would mean giving up MTB forever and any other of the fun sports.

I obviously need to wait until the Thrombosis clinic does a more thorough investigation, but I am trying to be realistic about the possible prognosis.

I feel like one of the only glimmers of hope is if Factor XI/XIa inhibitors become available to the market soon. Has anyone here managed to join a Phase 3 clinical trial?

Hi, this is my progress/success story. NOT MEDICAL ADVICE.

I realize theres always no good news reddit posts after people move on from their illness/medical procedures. So I wanted to post some good news stories.

10 years ago, I woke up in the middle of the night in college with my lung collapsed, and I fainted. I ended up in the ER and got the lung reinflated, but it started to deflate again a few days later, so I had VATS pneumothorax surgery/talc pleurodesis .

I've had a normal life since the surgery. (The first few years after the surgery, my chest felt off but thats prob from the inflammation; it gradually got better over time and never returned.)

So yeah, if you have any questions, just ask! And yeah, the surgery hurt like a motherfucker

Went in for my operation 4 weeks ago. Had around 5 X-rays all showing my lung was fully inflated. Had an air leak however when the portex chest drains were still in. I had them removed after 2 and a half weeks as they said the air leak had gone. Had an X Ray an hour after the drains came out, everything was fine and they discharged me.

2 days later I started getting shoulder pain the same as when I had the collapse. I did have the collapse for 10 months and this pain started 3 months after the collapse. So not the actual start of the collapse. I am breathing completely fine. The pain is right at the top of the shoulder almost towards the neck. It’s a very mild aching pain and it’s on and off, goes away when laying down.

I just don’t know if this needs checking? I’ve not bothered as they just keep sending me to A&E whenever I ring them up. Last time I was stuck in this horrible room squashed with ill people for 4 hours. When all I needed was an xray. I’m very paranoid.

3 years ago, I started to have exhaustion when I lie down facing upwards, or when I slouch.
Before this breathing difficulty symptom, I guess I just have the regular, low in stamina and fatigue issue. Those, I can live with it. But the hard to breathe in bed is a dreadful experience. Imagine you just finished a sprint and lie down immediately. Ya, that exact feeling. There will be some random morning exhaustion episode too. I'm not sure what is going on. Perhaps a new medical condition which has not been discovered yet.
Some context. 3 years ago, I had a huge noise neighbour dispute with my noisy neighbour. I slouch all day because I was too tired due to lack of sleep and stress from the dispute.

Hi everyone, I’m new to this sub, and it’s been really helpful for me since my mom got pneumothorax. It’s been four months since her surgery and she still feels so much tightness where it’s almost unbearable for her. It gets difficult for her to sit down, she can’t stay in the car because the bumpy roads hurts, and it’s really hard for her to sleep comfortably. She does try to stay active since the surgery btw. Doctors are saying they’re not concerned, and they’re not providing any solutions or any solid explanation at all. I feel so sad because this is really taking a toll on my mom’s mental well-being and I guess I just want some reassurance that what she’s going through will stop and maybe any types of advice people might have.

I'm 18 years old and 1.85m tall. Since yesterday, after I started taking sertraline, I've been having trouble breathing and sharp pains on the right side of my chest and back.

The symptoms come and go, so it might just be anxiety from the medication, but I'm terrified it could be a pneumothorax, especially since I live alone.

I am a 37 year old male. I smoked cigarettes for 23 years and quit June 23, 2026 and began vaping. I have been a daily, heavy, cannabis user since I was 17. The past year, I have been using vape pens and dabs more than smoking. I have always experience intense coughing from both cannabis vapes and smoking, never from tobacco. I have always weighed between 210 and 230 the past 5 to 10 years, did not workout, and had a not great diet, but felt healthy. Last december, my gallbladder had to be removed due to a stone stuck in the duct. I began using Zepbound this past January and have lost close to 70 pounds since then. 9 days ago, I woke up with chest pain, did not go away, so went to ER that afternoon. Left lung collapsed 30%. Kept me on o2 overnight and it collapsed further to 50%. Got the chest tube and it re-inflated almost instantly. Had tube in 2 days and was released 24 hours after removal of the tube.

Cannabis has been a part of my daily routine for years. I have never imagined my life without it. Edibles are great, but nothing beats that quick couple hits off the bowl after a stressful work meeting to get you through the rest of the day. Everything I am reading says it is the way it is smoked more than the smoke itself that increases risk of reoccurance. Today I pulled a few gravs and just dropped the bottle so the smoke went into the room and I just sat in the room and breathed normally. I dont think I will do it again before I get cleared in a few weeks at my follow up. I see this Stundenglass gravity infuser that basically does what I did above, eliminating the pressure changes traditional smoking creates. I have also thought about the Volcano desktop vaporizer. Anyhow, I would love to hear from anyone who faced this same thing and what you did to adjust? Did you get used to edibles only? Did you find an alternative that was similar to smoking or vaping? How did your life change by cutting back so much on usage? Were you able to find other outlets for your time and get to a point of a new normal?

Beyond the Cannabis discussion: my first follow up xray is 8/31 and I have a pulmonary function test that same day. I see the Pulmonologist on 9/8. What are the questions I should be asking? Is there a way for them to tell me if there are more air pockets on my lungs I need to worry about? Can I be scanned annually?

Anyone with a similar background that hasn't had anymore issues after their 1st collapse?

Just trying to navigate this whole thing and have just been feeling down, sleeping a lot, and wanting to get back to my normal energetic self.

TIA for your thoughts!

In March I had a spontaneous pneumothorax in my left lung which led to me having a chest drain while waiting for surgery. Once the procedure was done, a specialist came over and told them they had put it in the wrong way but this wasn’t rectified. I had this drain in for 8 or 9 days and the pain was excruciating due to it being directly on a nerve, I could barely move as it felt like my chest was literally ripping open anytime I tried. Despite being drugged on 2 different opioids and pregabalin, nothing helped and a nerve blocker was even administered, this was done by an untrained nurse who had to be talked through the procedure and it did nothing to help the pain. After a week suffering I was transferred to another hospital for my operation where I had a bullectomy and talc pleurodesis, the air drain was removed and a another one was inserted for about 4 days to remove the liquid on my lungs from the surgery and I was discharged once this was removed. It is now August and I still have pain in my lung where the chest drain was aswell as aching from deep breaths and coughing etc. the pain varies from burning, aching and sometimes electric shock/stabbing pain and I’m curious if anyone else experiences similar symptoms and if they have any advice, my doctors took me off of the pain meds after 2 months and was placed on a fostair steroid inhaler but this makes the pain worse. I’ve been waiting for months to be seen by a specialist(typical NHS). Will I ever go back to normal? Is this common?

Edit: I forgot to mention I tried returning to work after 2 months but had to be taken back to hospital due to increased pain and tight chest. It didn’t collapse again but I was told I returned to work too soon due to is being physical at times.

Hi everyone, I’m 21 and recently had my first spontaneous pneumothorax on the right side.
I’m tall and very thin (180 cm / 47 kg) and I have never had a previous pneumothorax. I was admitted to the hospital after a chest X-ray showed a small air gap between the lung and chest wall. The doctors gave me oxygen and monitored me overnight. They told me it was small enough that I didn’t need a chest tube, and the air was expected to reabsorb on its own.
I was discharged with instructions to rest and avoid heavy lifting/exercise. At follow-up, the doctor said things were looking good and that the pneumothorax had not increased in size.
My main concern now is recurrence. I’ve read that spontaneous pneumothorax can come back, especially in young, thin people. I’m also worried about having another episode unexpectedly in the future.
For people who have been through something similar:
Did your pneumothorax come back after your first episode? If so, how long later?
Did anyone choose VATS surgery after their first pneumothorax even without a recurrence?
Looking back, do you think preventive surgery after the first episode was worth it?
If you had surgery, did it significantly reduce your anxiety about recurrence?
Would you personally consider VATS after a first small pneumothorax, or would you wait and only do it if it recurred?
Did your CT show blebs/bullae, and did that affect your decision?
I’m trying to understand whether surgery would be excessive in my situation or whether it can be a reasonable option to reduce the risk of recurrence.
Thanks in advance for sharing your experiences.

Basically I have a lung that just cannot get itself back up and we’re now 3 weeks out from surgery and it’s clear that mechanical failed, so we’re now looking at me getting another round of VATS to do chemical (talc)

I’ve seen a study online that concluded that a person who has multiple pneumothoraxes, especially multiple within a year, is more likely to develop lung cancer (it was like 12.95 per 100k people vs 7 per 100k for people who don’t get pneumos). I’m nervous bc I do have family history on both sides of lung conditions: my aunt recently passed from COPD, my uncle died of lung cancer, and my great uncle on my other parents side died of emphysema. All three were decades-long heavy smokers, and I don’t smoke. But getting the talc makes me nervous due to my family history nonetheless given how difficult it can make future surgeries in that area.

Anyone got anymore information on this + are there any other conditions or cancers that SPs make you more prone to?