Narrator:
These men and women are fighting a common enemy: COPD – Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease. Their lungs don't work normally…every breath taken can be a struggle. What do they believe to be the cause?
Bill Durham COPD Patient:
Too many cigarettes. Smoked too long, about 40 years.
Loretta Freeman COPD Patient:
I started smoking when I was 17.
Joseph Burlas COPD Patient:
My wife says it's from 40 years of smoking.
Narrator:
That's true for about 85-percent of COPD cases.
Gerald Staton, MD:
We do see occasional patients that have various industrial exposures that can seem to contribute to that, but often they smoke cigarettes too and so it's probably a combination of factors.
Narrator:
Consider what happened to 59-year-old Gregory Wright. As a firefighter he was exposed to burning plastics, asbestos and chemicals. Then he worked at an airport breathing in noxious fumes and gases.
Gregory Wright, COPD Patient:
The doctor going over my medical history – did you ever smoke? Yes. I smoked for over 30 years.
Narrator:
Another troublesome combination:
Gerald Staton, MD:
Asthma seems to be a predisposition that if you are an asthmatic as a child and then smoke cigarettes then you have a fairly significantly higher risk of developing COPD later in life.
Narrator:
Then there's a particularly lethal mix: a genetic, or hereditary predisposition due to alpha 1 antitrypsin deficiency.
Diane Kay, COPD Patient:
I was diagnosed with alpha 1 in '99 but I had symptoms for years and being a flight attendant I had a difficult time keeping up with the rest of the crews.
Narrator:
Although rare, people like Diane Kay have low levels of a so-called lung protector protein that's produced by the liver.
Diane Kay, COPD Patient:
It took me forever to walk up the driveway from getting the mail.
I had to take breaks, and you just think you getting older and at that the time I was a smoker. so you think you know you're older and you smoking and you know. What do you expect?
Narrator:
She was susceptible to colds, bronchitis and laryngitis and it took her forever to get over these illnesses. The early COPD symptoms are often missed:
Gerald Staton, MD:
Even people in their 30's and 40's will have the so-called smoker's cough.
They think that's normal. They think everybody gets up in the morning and coughs up stuff, that's not normal. That's the beginning of symptoms.
Narrator:
Shortness of breath tends to develop in their late 40's and 50's. Diane finally had to give up her job:
Diane Kay, COPD Patient:
They kind of frown on flight attendants walking on an airplane with an oxygen mask (laughs).
Narrator:
Eventually it became so difficult for Diane to breathe that she ended up needing a lung transplant. Her advice: don't smoke.
Diane Kay, COPD Patient:
It basically caused me to have a transplant.
If I hadn't been a smoker or worked in an environment where there is second hand smoke I probably wouldn't have had a transplant I never would have gotten as sick as I got, as quickly as I did.
Narrator:
For WebMD, I'm Rhonda Rowland.
