Pulmonary tuberculosis in adults: symptoms and treatment

Tuberculosis is one of the most common diseases of mankind. The first mention of the disease can be found even in the treatises of Hippocrates. He believed that the disease is hereditary, but already Avicenna was able to prove that the disease is transmitted from person to person. Previously, tuberculosis was called consumption, to wither away from the word. Indeed, up to the 20th century, tuberculosis was considered an incurable disease. Modern medicine can detect and cure tuberculosis at an early stage of development.

Tuberculosis is an infectious disease caused by mycobacterium. It is called the Koch wand in honor of the German scientist Robert Koch, who discovered it in the 19th century. According to official data, about 9 million people become infected with tuberculosis every year.To defeat a disease, you need to know about its manifestations, causes, and methods of treatment.

Symptoms of tuberculosis

The incubation period of the disease can be from one to three months. The danger is that in the early stages of the disease, the symptoms are similar to a simple respiratory infection. As soon as the wand enters the body, it begins to spread through the blood to all organs, the first manifestations of infection appear.

1. With tuberculosis, a person feels weak, as at the beginning of ARVI. The efficiency decreases, apathy appears, constantly want to sleep, the patient gets tired quickly. Signs of intoxication do not pass for quite some time.
2. Tuberculosis is manifested by a strong cough that does not go away for long months. First, the cough may be dry, after some time, sputum begins to stand out. In the later stages of the disease, blood clots are expectorated from the lungs along with sputum. Cough worse lying down. Also, the disease is accompanied by shortness of breath with a feeling of lack of air, wet or dry wheezing.
3. The appearance of a patient with tuberculosis is also changing.He becomes unnaturally pale, unreasonably loses weight, facial features become angular, and an unhealthy sheen appears in his eyes. With developed or chronic tuberculosis, the cheeks fail, an unnatural blush may appear. As a rule, doctors can immediately suspect tuberculosis in a patient with characteristic changes in appearance.
4. Tuberculosis is accompanied by fever. In the early stages of the disease, subfebrile temperatures rarely exceed 37.5 degrees. However, it is the duration of the symptom that should alert the patient when the temperature does not return to normal for weeks or even months. This suggests a hidden inflammatory process in the body. Further, as the disease develops, the temperature rises above the designated mark and reaches 41 degrees, especially in the evening. This suggests a complete infection of the body. Active sweating does not contribute to the normalization of temperature.
5. The development of tuberculosis is accompanied by pain in the chest, under the shoulder blades, under the ribs. At the initial stage, there is only a slight discomfort.The pain increases as the body becomes infected, each time it becomes more penetrating and acute. Particularly severe pain is felt when inhaling.
6. Often, tuberculosis is accompanied by an increase in lymph nodes.

More often, tuberculosis affects the lungs - in almost 90% of cases. However, mycobacterium can be dangerous for other organs. The patient can be diagnosed with tuberculosis of the urogenital system, bones, central nervous system, and digestive organs. Symptoms of the disease in this case are caused by a malfunction of the affected organs.

Causes of tuberculosis

As was noted, tuberculosis can be infected by a sick person through airborne droplets.

1. The most common infection comes from a sick person - when he talks, sneezes, coughs or sings in the immediate vicinity. When talking, saliva can reach a healthy person at a distance of 1 meter, when coughing and sneezing - up to three meters.
2. Tuberculosis can get sick from eating contaminated products, if they were previously touched or packed by an infected person. Most often it is dairy products and fresh meat.This can be avoided if the products are subjected to prolonged heat treatment.
3. Often, the infection occurs in a household way, when people live on the same territory and are forced to use common hygiene items - towels, dishes, etc.
4. Another method of infection is intrauterine. If the expectant mother is infected with tuberculosis, most likely the baby will also suffer from this disease.
5. In some cases, the body can resist infection, even if the bacillus has entered the bloodstream. With a sufficiently high immunity, the body's defenses prevent the spread of infection. The risk of infection increases with hypothermia, poor nutrition, drug intake, stress, as well as with concomitant infectious diseases.

Most often, people infected with tuberculosis are forced to live in small residential premises, when isolation is simply impossible. A few decades ago, tuberculosis was considered a disease of prisons. Indeed, in such institutions, tuberculosis developed particularly rapidly, they were infected by everyone around, since the cells were densely populated.

Form and diagnosis of tuberculosis

Tuberculosis can have two forms - open and closed. The open form of tuberculosis is considered very dangerous, because in this case the patient is infectious to others. Mycobacterium with an open form of the disease is contained in any physiological secretions - urine, feces, blood, saliva, sputum, etc. The closed form of the disease is not considered dangerous to others, because the wand is not allocated. However, tuberculosis at any time from a closed form can go into the open.

Diagnosing TB with high accuracy is quite difficult. The simplest thing is to do a Mantoux test. Under the skin of the patient injected composition containing the treated tubercle bacilli - tuberculin. If the organism has never before encountered such pathogens, it will not give a sufficient response, since it does not recognize the enemy. If a person is sick with tuberculosis, the body recognizes the pathogen and begins to actively fight, a reaction occurs at the injection site - swelling, redness. By the size of the reaction to the Mantoux test, it is possible to determine the patient's infection. However, this method is not 100% informative, therefore, smear examination, sputum culture, and X-ray of the lungs are also used to diagnose the disease.One of the modern methods of detecting tuberculosis is a polymer chain reaction, sputum is taken for analysis. The result of this analysis is very accurate, reaching 100%.

Tuberculosis Treatment

Treatment of tuberculosis is a very long, systemic process. To get rid of the disease completely, you need to put a lot of effort and patience. It is almost impossible to cure yourself at home, as the Koch wand eventually gets used to many drugs and loses sensitivity.

1. Even if tuberculosis is not resistant to the drugs used, treatment at best takes 6-8 months. The duration of treatment can last 2-3 years. The disease often escalates in spring and autumn. With the detection of tuberculosis, the patient is placed in a hospital, where he is about two months, until it becomes safe for others. Further treatment continues on an outpatient basis.
2. Tuberculosis is a TB doctor.
3. Treatment of tuberculosis is carried out according to the scheme, with the use and alternation of at least four or five chemotherapeutic drugs. In no case should you take a break in treatment, otherwise the results will be lost, and the disease will begin to progress again.
4. Before prescribing adequate treatment, sputum culture is done in order to determine the resistance of the pathogen to certain drugs. This is a necessary condition for the treatment to be effective. In some cases, resistance can be both innate and acquired.
5. Most often, drugs such as Streptomycin, Isoniazid, Ethambutol, Rifapicin, Pyrazinamide are used in the treatment of tuberculosis. The doctor prescribes and selects the treatment regimen in each case individually.
6. If the patient’s condition does not improve after long-term treatment, second-line drugs are prescribed - Ethionamide, Cycloserine, Ofloxacin, Pask, Capriomycin. These drugs are very expensive, unfortunately, not everyone can afford such treatment.
7. The method of administration of drugs may be different. Injections and inhalations are most commonly used, in order for the medicine to go directly to the inflammatory focus - in the lungs.
8. In conjunction with medical treatment, preventive stay in recreation areas is a must. Sanatoriums for tubercular patients are usually located in forests and mountains with conifers.Clean, high-tar air contributes to a speedy recovery.
9. By law, a patient with tuberculosis is treated in a hospital or sanatorium by force so that he does not infect healthy people.
10. Equally important in the fight against tuberculosis is nutrition. In the patient's diet should be nutritious and healthy foods to help the patient recuperate and gain weight lost. Required to use drinks that excite the appetite - broth hips, yogurt, ryazhenka. Also, the patient is prescribed vitamins that will help strengthen the immune system and bring the body out of exhaustion.
11. Alcohol and smoking during the period of treatment, of course, is prohibited.
12. In addition, there is a latent form of tuberculosis, when the wand enters the body, and its immunity suppresses it. In this case, the disease does not develop, but the person is considered a carrier of tuberculosis, even without suspecting it.

Tuberculosis is a very unpleasant and prolonged disease. Many doctors believe that most people suffer from tuberculosis in conditions of poverty and poor sanitation. If your body is infected with Koch's wand, do not despair, this is not a sentence at all.With proper approach and proper treatment of tuberculosis, it is quite possible to cure. At the same time, it is important to observe elementary preventive measures in order not to infect other people.

Tuberculosis prevention

These rules must comply with both healthy and infected people.

1. As soon as you suspect tuberculosis in yourself or in someone of your loved ones, you should contact the tuberculosis dispensary as soon as possible at the place of registration to identify the diagnosis and isolate the patient.
2. Tuberculosis in prisons is developing with a geometric progression. This is due to the confined space, improper treatment, low immunity of patients.
3. One can become infected with tuberculosis through saliva, sputum, blood, potassium, and urine of a sick person. Koch's wand is very tenacious - it can remain viable for up to 10 days, and in dark and damp places for up to several months.
4. It is very important to strengthen the immune system, because the body itself is able to suppress the infection. To do this, you need to eat properly and in a balanced way, consume sufficient amount of vitamins with food or in capsules. Enhance health will help an active lifestyle, compliance with basic rules of hygiene.
5. To treat the room after a patient with tuberculosis, it is necessary to thoroughly rinse all solid objects with a concentrated chlorine solution. All textile items need not just wash and boil and iron.
6. In civilized countries, twice a year, they undergo a preventive medical examination, the list of which includes fluorography. The picture allows you to identify the disease at an early stage of development, which makes its treatment much more effective.
7. Preventing tuberculosis is the first thing to stop smoking. When the lungs are affected by the Koch bacillus pathogen, nicotine exposure increases tissue destruction, the disease progresses at a much higher rate.

But the most effective protection against tuberculosis is a BCG vaccine. Normally, it is placed in the maternity hospital in the first 3-5 days after the birth of the child. Vaccination does not protect the baby completely, but reduces the risk of infection and dangerous complications by 70%.

Tuberculosis is a serious disease that is still considered deadly. In today's world, millions of people are infected every year, thousands of them die. Most often, death from tuberculosis occurs in cases of low social status.patients, when the patient can not provide adequate treatment or the disease is started so much that when it comes to the doctor, the specialists can do nothing. If we recognize the disease in time, carry out proper treatment and be regularly monitored by a doctor, tuberculosis can be defeated. Watch your body - this is the main condition for maintaining health!

Video: treatment of pulmonary tuberculosis in adults