Another long -term concern is pulmonary fibrosis, a progressive disease in which the scars thicken and harden the lung tissue, which make it difficult for oxygen to move in the blood flow. Dr. Elsayegh describes a lung with pulmonary fibrosis like “a rigid balloon from the party shop” – your face is blushed while trying to force the air inside, but simply refuses to swell.
As a former resident of Palisades intent on returning to the neighborhood, Dr. Elsayegh is also doubling as a confident of trust, drawing on his personal experience to help his patients face uncertainties and find solutions – or at least the next steps.
“In an ideal world, I would go there and I would say:” Everyone who lives in the Palized and in the county of Los Angeles, we all go. We all go somewhere else and we must not worry about this, “he said.” It is not reality. I am trying to find this incredibly difficult balance to help us return to normal or go back to our life, but do it as safe as possible. “
At the beginning of February, Dr. Elsayegh pulled in a chair next to Dana Michels, a computer security lawyer and a healthy mother of three children who had gone to check the damage to her home and now she could not shake her cough.
“Treasure, you're not moving air at all,” said dr. Elsayegh, listening to his lungs through a stethoscope and to quickly start a breathing test and a nebulizer. A pulmonary student asked to listen, then he took a look at Dr. Elsayegh, seeming confused.
“I feel nothing,” said the student. Dr. Elsayegh gave only one nod.
After years of rent, Mrs. Michels and her husband obtained their first mortgage almost four years ago; It was a milestone of the family. Now, with their Palisades at a smoked home, the family is divided between two apartments for rent in Marina del Rey – one for the boys, one for girls – and are browsing in a new school, new waste and new prescriptions to manage the hissing breath.