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    leoto's Avatar
    leoto Posts: 21, Reputation: 1
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    #1

    Oct 11, 2008, 08:09 PM
    Possible piece of food in lung?
    On Thursday night just passed, I was eating chicken nuggets and fries. I went to speak, but before I did, I breathed in and a small piece of nugget went down the wrong way but I coughed maybe once or twice but it didn't feel as though I coughed it up or swallowed it. I haven't ha any pains or have felt anything as if there was something in my lung.
    So what I was wondering is if it could be there and not feel it or would there be a feeling if there was something there? Because I only think about it every now and again, and I was just thinking about it now, and then I start to panic. I get wheezy sometimes with my allergies when the weather changes so I might just be panicking over nothing, as I tend to panic over many things.
    twinkiedooter's Avatar
    twinkiedooter Posts: 12,172, Reputation: 1054
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    #2

    Oct 11, 2008, 08:55 PM

    I had something similar happen to me when I was a young teenager. I had inhaled some meat into my lungs. This bothered me for years when I would laugh hard or sometimes when I would run my left lung would hurt. Well, this went on for years. Once when I had a very bad chest congestion I coughed up something out of my lungs. It looked like a plug! Then after the plug came out of my left lung, it would hurt to take a deep breath. This went on for a few days and then I've been fine ever since. Apparently that plug of meat was in my lungs for years!

    If you are having any kind of pains in your upper lung area, I would suggest you go and have an X-ray performed to see if the chicken piece is stuck in one of your upper bronchial tubes (like my piece of meat was). Don't ask me how they'll remove it, but if it needs removed, please have this done. You might not be as lucky(?) as I was in that it came out on it's own.
    leoto's Avatar
    leoto Posts: 21, Reputation: 1
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    #3

    Oct 12, 2008, 10:52 AM

    Thanks for the info. I think I made it worse for myself last night because I thought of it a lot, and then caused myself to cough a lot. I don't have any pain whatsoever, I think from all the coughing I made myself do last night caused congestion(as I get this a lot when the weather changes due to my allergies) and have had no discomfort at all. Plus, I started to get a sore throat, only when I wake up in the mornings, but this started to happen before this food incident, I hate how dry air gives me such a bad throat. But if something does seem to develop, I will have it checked out right away.
    wildandblue's Avatar
    wildandblue Posts: 663, Reputation: 57
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    #4

    Oct 12, 2008, 11:39 AM

    The windpipe in your throat divides into two branches one going to each lung, then gets smaller and smaller as it approaches the lungs itself, just like the circulatory system, there are large arteries and vieins attached to the heart which get smaller as they spread throughout the body. So something could be stuck in the upper part of the tube only. Unless it was stuck in your mouth against your will it is not likely to be wedged in so tightly that normal coughing won't dislodge it, unless of course it is blocking the main windpipe, like a piece of hotdog could, in which case since you can't draw air in to cough you are in trouble unless someone comes to your aid... (you can even fall against the edge of a table and do the Heimlich maneuver on yourself if no one's around).
    Usually a foreign body in the lungs would get coated with mucus which would make it slippery enough to be coughed up, and serve to protect the lung itself.
    Any discomfort you feel could just be a scratch or abrasion on the sensitive tissue from the piece of unchewed food scraping it instead of the actual food still being stuck there.

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