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When I cough my chest pain gets worse. Is it something serious?

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When I cough my chest pain gets worse. Is it something serious?

The following is an actual conversation between an iCliniq user and a doctor that has been reviewed and published as a Premium Q&A.

Answered by

Dr. Vivek Chail

Medically reviewed by

iCliniq medical review team

Published At December 2, 2017
Reviewed AtFebruary 26, 2024

Patient's Query

Hi doctor,

I am a 60 year old female. I weigh 154.4 pounds and my height is 5 feet. I am a known diabetic and hypertensive and on regular medications. I have been suffering with dry cough, fever and chest pain. When I cough my chest pain gets worse. I am unable to take deep breath, because if I inhale deeply then the chest pain increases. I have completely no appetite from last 25 days. I am feeling weak. Due to my illness I have visited at our local hospital. I have told every health issues to the doctor and he suggested me to do an x-ray of chest PA view and multiple blood tests. I am attaching the reports for your reference. After the tests I visited the doctor again and he said everything is alright. But there is a little infection. And he suggested me few antibiotics namely Azithromycin with Ofloxacin SR tablets for 5 days, a vitamin syrup named fortified vitamin B-complex, L-lysine, Zinc syrup, cough syrup Grilinctus and few more tablets. For past four days, I am taking all the medicine, but I am not getting well. Moreover my chest pain has increased and I am having stomach upset and going to washroom frequently. I have some doubts in my x-ray report. Because x-ray of healthy lungs should be clear, but there is some white appearance in x-ray. Can you please check the reports again including blood test reports? Tell me if there is anything wrong. Also give me a detailed answer in regard to my health condition. Thank you in advance.

Answered by Dr. Vivek Chail

Hello,

Welcome to icliniq.com.

I have read through your query in detail and gone through your reports (attachment removed to protect the patient's identity). Please find my observations below. The chest x-ray shows certain changes which are expected for your age. There are no significant shadows showing any problem in lungs. There is no sign of serious disease on the chest x-ray. The heart shadow and aorta are mildly prominent. But, this is seen in many patients at your age. Your random blood sugar RBS appears to be at upper limit of normal. To get a more accurate status of your sugar control, please get HbA1C (glycated hemoglobin) test done and this tells sugar over average of three months. It should be less than 6.2 in people with good diabetes control. I suggest you to take tablet Ofloxacin is a broad spectrum antibiotic and recommended for certain infection. Also i suggest you to take tablet Azithromycin (Azithromycin dihydrate) is a powerful antibiotic and must be given with caution to people at your age. It can cause increase in heart problem, if you already have any heart problem. Please inform your doctor of any heart problem next time when you are given tablet Azithromycin. Kidney function and urine test are normal. Calcium levels in blood are low and you can take foods having high calcium. White blood cell count is slightly increased. ESR (erythrocyte sedimentation rate) value is also high and this might indicate a low intensity infection within you. Hemoglobin is normal and TSH (thyroid stimulating hormone) in thyroid function test is also normal. The result in Widal test BH reactive might indicate a mild stomach infection. However, it is not significant. Since other titers are normal. If you have the infection then tablet Ofloxacin which you are taking will treat it completely. Grilinctus (Dextromethorphan hydrobromide) is a cough preparation and will help soothe your throat. Also start taking vitamin syrups can be continued. Please take your diabetes tablets regularly with food. The cough might be due to flu and weather changes and is persisting probably due to dust pollution and hot weather. Please avoid going outside in hot temperature and protect yourself from dust and pollution. Diabetes itself causes patients to have other infections and delays recovery. Kindly observe better control over diabetes and blood pressure. You can allow 15 days time after medicines for the dry cough to get cured. If you still have dry cough even after 15 days of taking the above treatment and protecting yourself from dust then doing a CT scan of chest might be required to evaluate any changes in smaller airways and lungs which is not clearly seen on the chest x- ray. The chest pain following repeated dry cough is explained due to muscle contractions and it does not mean that there is any serious problem in the chest. Please eat home cooked healthy diabetes food at home and avoid taking outside food for two to four weeks. Wishing you a quick recovery. I hope this helps. Thank you and take care.

Same symptoms don't mean you have the same problem. Consult a doctor now!

Dr. Vivek Chail
Dr. Vivek Chail

General Practitioner

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