Bronchiectasis is a lung condition in which some of the bronchi and bronchioles have lost their elasticity and have expanded and filled with fluid. With bronchiectasis, these natural cleaning mechanisms have become damaged or destroyed. Although bronchiectasis can develop at any age, it generally begins during childhood. The mucus is then normally wafted away by the beating of tiny hairs called cilia which line the tubes see figure.

The bronchial dilatations may be cylindrical or tubular, sacular or globular, fusiform or pyriform, moniliform or bead like. The bronchiectatic cavities mostly formed in lower lobes. Lining membrane is formed by granulation tissue or ciliated epithelium. Inflammatory changes are found in deeper layers of bronchial walls. Surrounding lung tissues may be fibrosed.

Obstruction to the bronchus due to any cause leads to distal collapse of the pulmonary segment. The pull on the bronchi by the collapsed alveoli leads to dilatation of the bronchi. In the initial stages this is reversible and the bronchi regain their normal size when the lung expands. If the obstruction persists, accumulation of mucus occurs distally, infection supervenes and the bronchial wall is destroyed permanently. This results in permanent dilatation.

Coughing is an important way to keep your throat and airways clear. Coughing is an action the body takes to get rid of burden that are irritating the air passages. In the more advanced stages, it's marked by the symptom that gives the disease its name: a severe, hacking cough followed by a high-pitched intake of breath that sounds like "whoop. Coughing can also be triggered by a bolus of food going down the trachea instead of the esophagus due to a failure of the epiglottis although this may result in choking instead.

Based on several tests, your physician will decide if you suffer from COPD and how severe your individual case is. Since symptoms of COPD may be similar to asthma, pulmonary fibrosis, cystic fibrosis, bronchiectasis and some other illnesses, doctors rely on lung function tests and spirometry tests to conclusively determine COPD in a patient.

Difficulty or shortness of breath associated with marked awareness of the effort of respiration is called dyspnea. In the left-sided heart failure and in hypoventilatory states, the patient becomes more dypsneic in the recumbent posture and considerable relief is obtained by sitting up. This is referred to as orthopnea. Attacks of severe breathlessness occurring during sleep at night may awaken the patient and assumption of the erect posture gives relief.

Pleural effusion: In this condition, fluid accumulates between the two layers of the pleura. Normally, pleura contains only a small amount of fluid. The pleural fluid remains in dynamic equilibrium with blood. Movements of the lung favour the movement of the fluid in and out of the pleural space. In most of the disease states, absorption of the fluid is reduced. The fluid may be contained in the general pleural space or it may be loculated in the interlobar fissure, infrapulmonary space or may remain adjacent to the mediastinum.

A chronic heart condition, cor pulmonale is an enlargement of the right ventricle that results from various lung diseases, except those that primarily affect the left side of the heart, or congenital heart disease. Invariably, cor pulmonale follows some disorder of the lungs, pulmonary vessels, chest wall, or respiratory control center. For instance, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease produces pulmonary hypertension, which leads to right ventricular enlargement and failure.

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