mucus menifests pattern?

I have a "period" of about 3-4 days. When it was "good" for 1 or 2 days then it like becomes
"worse" soon. And vice versa.

However, I could be atypical with my stable pneumothorax,bulla,
traction bronchiectases,pleural problems

I usually get urge to cough, first it is dry but after 10 min or such it is productive
And surprisingly some coughing lozenge, which never helped much before
to me or to others ,
suppresses the (BE-related ?) urge to cough very well.
But presumably this only delays the need for productive coughing
with it's 3-4 day - frequency

My pulmonologist told me that it’s typical to produce different amounts of secretions on different days. If it’s dramatically different on a particular day and I think there’s more to get out I’ll try another nebulizer session. Generally speaking, I use the same number of tissues to catch the gunk give or take one or two.

I also produce different amounts on different days. It seems to me it goes in somewhat of a pattern 3-4 (less mucus) bad days, followed by 1-2 (more mucus) good days. It seems as though for me the mucus is in layers so to speak, I can only assume then when I speak of layers I’m referring to locations of mucus in specific lobes in my lungs. With easiest to expell is in the upper lobes, and of course hardest to expel being the lower lobes. That’s the only reasonable explanation I can think of. I too had my Mayo Pulmonologist tell me it’s typical to have ups & down with BE & ILD.

In addition does anyone know if the knew medication Brensocatib that we all hope gets approved, helps with our mucus production/expeling? I would hope to hear from anyone who was in the clinical trials. Thank you

Has anyone wondered if what we eat one day and not the other day might have caused greater mucus than another? I wonder?
I wonder if what we do physically also can change the mucus build up from one day to the next.?
As the doctors have said to us, they don't know for sure, completely, what causes BE and for each of us it may have been different events etc. that caused our BE???? So I wonder if they know, completely, why one day the mucus is worse than another.
What we do know for sure is how hard it is to do all we need to do to clear it and avoid further problems.!
Hope all are doing well today.
Barbara

@spider109 My understanding is that Brensocatib helps to reduce lung inflammation by turning off neutrophil enzymes. It might result in fewer secretions as a result. Airway clearance will continue to be essential despite being on the drug as brensocatib will not reverse bronchiectasis. There are several more drugs in development for us as well. Fingers crossed.

Yes scoop let’s hope that is the case for all of us that have alot of secretions, I do understand airway clearance will still have to be done and understandably so to prevent infection primarily. Just FYI looking at my previous several blood draws and my latest sputum culture, Neutrophils always high!!! I know Dr. Daley from NJH I believe he has said 80% of BE patients have high neutrophil counts. 🤞🤞🤞

Thank you, I was wondering that also about Brensocatib. How it would help. Turning off inflammation makes it sound like breathing better which would be such a relief!

This is so interesting, as my Neutrophils have never been high. Maybe the medication won't work for me 🙁

Sometimes we can have both neutrophilic and eosinophilic features. For example, my last sputum test showed 4+ polys, which is a high level of neutrophils, suggesting neutrophilic inflammation. BUT, I also have an IgE over 600, suggesting eosinophilic inflammation. If we are willing to try brensocatib it seems like that's the only real way to see if it helps. Fingers crossed!