I've been diagnosed with a chest infection - advice please

[imaginaryfriend]

I started to feel ill 2 weeks ago with a really agonising pain in my right side, all round my ribs, under my armpit and in the back of my shoulder. I also had a high fever but no cough. This happened for 2 evenings in a row then the pain seemed to go and I was left with just a high fever on and off.

I only forced myself to the GP last week and he sent me for a chest x-ray and some blood tests and the x-ray shows I have an infection in my left lung, the right side is clear. So I'm totally confused as to why I had / still have the pain in my right side. Also I'm not coughing an awful lot, just a bit, and I'd have thought I'd have a really awful cough with a chest infection.

Any advice? I'm still having bad fevers, taking nurofen and paracetamol to keep myself going and I keep getting the chest pain intermittently.

You can get what's called transfered pain, which is pain from one place which is felt somewhere else. It could be this. It sounds more like plurasy (sp?), then a chest infection to be honest. I'd go back to the GP if you are concerned.

Yes, I thought pleurisy as I had that when I was 17 but the x-ray showed infection on the left side. I will go back to the GP on Tuesday when my regualar GP is back. I had to see the rubbish one last week.

The whole of my right rib cage area is also very tender to touch. DP suggested it might be that my glands are up on that side?

Hmm. There would be a broductive cough with a chest infection. It can be hard to tell where the infection is on a chest film though. The antibiotics should start to kick in after a few days.
I'll take bets on it being pleurisy. You don't have glands on your rib cage, you have some under though.

Would pleurisy last this long though? And I wouldn't need antibiotics would I as it's a viral thing usually?

It could be both. You are more likely to get pleurisy with another infection, like pneumonia (chest infection). Antibiotics do work for pleurisy .

Thanks. Would pleurisy show up on a chest x-ray?

any other advice?

bump

Oh I hope it isn't pleurisy . That is soooo painful. I remember getting past the point of thinking I was dying, and started wanting to!

I specialised in horrible chest illnesses when I was a child.

Sorry you are feeling so bad if.

Well it was excruciatingly painful the first two days it started but it's been quite diffuse and on and off since. But I can't shake the headaches, fevers and total fatigue.

If it is pneumonia (sometimes called a "chest infection") then you may not have a wet cough until the antibiotics kick in and often not at all. Many viral infections will not be helped by antibiotics, but if they don't shift quickly, a secondary bacterial infection can move in.

If you have been coughing at all then the pain in your ribcage could be a muscle/rib cartilage strain. This happened to me earlier in the year and was bloody painful. It hurt on sneezing, coughing, movement and breathing. In fact, I still have a slight discomfort now, several months on.

Try to eat well, even if you don't feel like it. I lost a fair bit of weight which I still haven't regained. Although you might say that is an advantage as I can fit into some stuff I had "grown out of".

Hope you feel better soon.

I had pneumonia and pleurisy back in Feb/March. I was surprised at how bad I felt, and for how long. Go back when you have finished your course of antibiotics if you still have pain and fever. I had I think 5 courses. And a series of x rays to check what was going on.

Take care.

af, thanks, that's useful to know. I had no idea you could have pneumonia / chest infection without a cough. maybe I have pulled a muscle while coughing but it seems so unlikely as I've been coughing fairly little, although not not at all.

FM, could you describe what you felt like with Pleurisy / chest infection? Were they both on the same side?

I have had both - pleuresy and a selection of chest infections.

Pleuresy - felt like a heart attack and/or borken ribs. It hurt like hell every time I breathed. It can be bacterial - mine responded to anti-biotics

Chest infections were, for me, usually characterised by fever, coughing and massive asthma attacks

BTW now my asthma meds are sorted I haven't had any chest infections for a few years.

My chest pain felt like that when it started but only for 2 nights. Did yours last at that rate of pain for long?

I've also had pneumonia twice before and the fever side of this feels similar but I had a much worse cough and also bad asthma.

I'm on such a strong inhaler now, I'm not sure they'd give me an even stronger one.

I did actually think I had broken a rib. It was appallingly painful. Breathing, shifting position at all very very painful. It was on the same side as the infection for me. I also had fevers which came and went. So I'd think I was getting better only to get very feverish again. And exhausted too. Coughed a fair amount at the beginning, but cough went but x rays still showed infection.

FM how long was the pleurisy that painful for? Maybe I've got the aftermath of it and a chest infection on the other side too? How was your pleurisy diagnosed?

Pleuresy is very painful. I felt like I had been permanently winded. It hurt whenever I took a breath (I could only manage little half breaths the pain was sooo bad). The antibiotics I had finally sorted it out. Mind you I had to be hospitalised first as I was 21 weeks pg, had been into A&E during the night and the A&E dr sent me home to have some paracetamol (pratt). The GP I saw the following day was horrified at my treatment. On doing (or more to the point failing to do) a peak flow he phoned the hospital straight away and made damn sure they were waiting for me!!!
Chest infections tend to be more coughy and 'wet'.

TBH I can't remember exactly how long it lasted. I was at college at the time (a long long time ago) and remember lying in bed thinking how absolutely impossible it would be to get down 1 flight of stairs to go get food, but I do remember the pain receeded within 48 hours of starting antibiotics.

Ok, well if I did have pleurisy I don't have it now from your descriptions as it's coming and going and not painful all the time.

I saw my regular GP this morning and she thinks the right-hand pain is transferred pain from the infection on the left hand side. She read through the x-ray report and also had my blood tests back - the inflammation markers were through the roof. She's given me 2 different antibiotics to take and is sending me for blood tests for atypical pneumonia - Legionella and Micoplasma.

blimey, good luck