“COPD diagnosis?”
My 75 year old mother and myself and my sibling were just told that my mom had stage 4 COPD. My question is what would you say about her life span?
Female | 75 years old
2 Answers
Hello,
You and your family have been told that your 75 year old mother has been diagnosed with stage 4 COPD. Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is an inflammatory condition in which the lungs progressively become more and more disabled and ultimately become unable to provide enough oxygen to the body to enable normal functioning. It is staged with stage 1 being the least severe and progressing to severe lung dysfunction (stage 4).
Many times various medications can be used to treat the symptoms. Oxygen is often prescribed to help a person breathe. These illnesses are caused by exposure to toxic gases or cigarette smoke for long time periods.
A good source for information can be found online on “entirelyhealth.com”. They have a good discussion of the illness and treatment approaches.
If your mother was a smoker it would be advisable to stop smoking. She needs to take medications that are provided by her doctor.
It is difficult to predict the prognosis of people suffering from COPD. If she follows the advice of her doctor she may live for a few years. But the life expectancy may be significantly less than this. She can also develop intercurrent illnesses such as pneumonia which are more difficult to treat in patients with severe emphysema (another name for COPD).
She needs much familial support to allow her quality of life to be the best that it can be.
Good luck.
You and your family have been told that your 75 year old mother has been diagnosed with stage 4 COPD. Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is an inflammatory condition in which the lungs progressively become more and more disabled and ultimately become unable to provide enough oxygen to the body to enable normal functioning. It is staged with stage 1 being the least severe and progressing to severe lung dysfunction (stage 4).
Many times various medications can be used to treat the symptoms. Oxygen is often prescribed to help a person breathe. These illnesses are caused by exposure to toxic gases or cigarette smoke for long time periods.
A good source for information can be found online on “entirelyhealth.com”. They have a good discussion of the illness and treatment approaches.
If your mother was a smoker it would be advisable to stop smoking. She needs to take medications that are provided by her doctor.
It is difficult to predict the prognosis of people suffering from COPD. If she follows the advice of her doctor she may live for a few years. But the life expectancy may be significantly less than this. She can also develop intercurrent illnesses such as pneumonia which are more difficult to treat in patients with severe emphysema (another name for COPD).
She needs much familial support to allow her quality of life to be the best that it can be.
Good luck.
The staging of COPD is a little bit confusing in so far as it does not necessarily reflect a person's disease burden per se. Indeed some people with higher stages could have minimal symptoms where as others could be fairly sick and other medical components need to be looked into to have a better idea of how a person will eventually do.
The clinical parameters that will affect the patient's overall condition and maybe their life span generally include:
- Degree of symptoms including cough, sputum production, shortness of breath, oxygen requirement, and responsiveness to various breathing treatments.
- Frequency of flare-ups of the disease within a year including the need for hospitalization and additional treatments. People with frequent flare-ups will necessarily not do as well.
- The presence of other associated medical conditions particularly in the older individual.
- Maintenance of appropriate fitness/endurance levels such as with exercise, rehabilitation or other interventions would add a positive note to the overall survival.
In general, therefore it is not very straightforward and there are no particular heart numbers to predict survival as there would be for example in cancer conditions.
The clinical parameters that will affect the patient's overall condition and maybe their life span generally include:
- Degree of symptoms including cough, sputum production, shortness of breath, oxygen requirement, and responsiveness to various breathing treatments.
- Frequency of flare-ups of the disease within a year including the need for hospitalization and additional treatments. People with frequent flare-ups will necessarily not do as well.
- The presence of other associated medical conditions particularly in the older individual.
- Maintenance of appropriate fitness/endurance levels such as with exercise, rehabilitation or other interventions would add a positive note to the overall survival.
In general, therefore it is not very straightforward and there are no particular heart numbers to predict survival as there would be for example in cancer conditions.
