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bronchiectasis and high eosinophil count
MAC & Bronchiectasis | Last Active: Aug 14 4:44am | Replies (19)Comment receiving replies
Good morning @wangling and welcome to our Mayo Connect community. We are a group living with bronchiectasis & a variety of related conditions, and I dare say you will find someone whose experience is similar to yours. If you are like many of us, you turned to "Dr. Google" and read lots of scary things, so I'm glad you feel like we offer hope. We are here to share the journey with you and to assure you that bronchiectasis is a disease you can learn to manage and still continue to live a full life.
As for elevated eosinophils, with bronchiectasis it may be a question of "which came first" - elevated numbers may be from an underlying condition like asthma or infection. This, along with the underlying condition, can predispose up to bronchiectasis.
Here is what Mayo has to say about high eosinophils: https://www.mayoclinic.org/symptoms/eosinophilia/basics/definition/sym-20050752
What led to your diagnosis? Were you having lung issues, or was it found during imaging for something else?
Feel free to come and ask any & all questions!
Sue
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Hi Sue,
Thank you so much for your reply and thank you for being the voluntary monitor for this group to offer help and hope which is very comforting to me.
Last Oct. I started coughing, especially bad at night. I went to see 4 different doctors, they could not identify anything wrong, x-ray showed nothing. The coughing never went away and in Feb. this year I got pneumonia. During pneumonia treatment, they did a wide range of blood tests and lung function tests. The function test was normal and a CT scan in March showed pneumonia. But cough mucus never went away, because of all the test results, doctors believe that I was healing slowly from pneumonia. But recently my condition got worse. I was out of breath while walking. And I got so much more mucus. So they did another CT scan. This time, it came with the bad news, I had infections in my lungs and mild bronchiectasis. I have not done another test to identify NTM yet. I might need it in the future. As you all know bronchiectasis is not going to kill us right away, but it makes us so susceptible to infections which is scary. I was so happy to find you, living a normal life with this disease. This means so much to me. I feel like this is a new family I belong to. In this family we help one another, encourage one another and give advice to one another, and give hope to one another. Right now I am still gathering information on how to control my bronchiectasis condition and try to live a normal life as you all do.My pulmonologist asked me to use the albuterol twice a day before I use a mucus device to get mucus out. Reading your posts, it seems that keeping the airway clean is the key to avoiding infections, is that right? It seems you all use Nebulised 7% hypertonic saline. And some people use smartvest. Should I start using them? I read your earlier post, you mentioned finding a bronchiectasis specialist to work with is very important. I think it is a good idea. I found a pulmonologist focusing on bronchiectasis. I will try to get an appointment with him and see what he says. But you live with this disease and know what works and what not. I truly value your opinions. Please let me know what you think I should do at my stage. I want to live a normal life, a full life like you say. Many thanks agaiin!
Ling