Heavy mucus, difficulty in eating or drinking until long hacking episodes to eject mucus. Family history of thyroid. Reason?
Patient: I am coughing up a lot of mucus over the past several weeks. The mucus hacking episodes last for 15 minutes of gagging to get this stuff out. It doesn t stop for me until I get out the clump of mucus which is sometimes a dark brown, yellow, or red color. The majority of the mucus is a thick and white. It is to the point where I can t eat or drink until the stuff comes out. It makes me dizzy by the end of the episode of hacking. I don t have any food allergies . My dad s side of the family has thyroid, heart, and digestive problems. My grandma and dad had some procedure done to their throats. I have been tested for hypothyroidism many times and I come back clean. The only digestive problem I have had is with constipation , but I had a colonoscopy and everything was fine. I m not pregnant. I haven t done anything for this except gargle warm salt water and mucunex stuff. Nothing is working. I don t smoke or do drugs. I don t know what s wrong with me. Doctor: Hi Montoya, Thanks for writing your query.  After reading your post, it seems that you are having bronchitis and lower respiratory tract infection. First of all you should get the following investigations done :- 1. Chest X-ray PA view 2. Complete Blood Count (CBC) 3. Sputum examination (Culture and Senstivity and AFB testing)  Yellow and thick mucus can be due to some infection in the respiratory tract. Red colour in the sputum can be due to some leakage of blood from thin blood vessels as a result of severe coughing .  You can take bronchodilators like Levosalbutamol along with mucolytics like Bromhexine.  Antibiotics, if needed can be started according to the culture/senstivity report. Steam inhalation and chest physiotherapy will also help to cough out mucus easily.  You should get yourself examined medically and investigated before starting any medication.  I hope this is helpful to you. Thanks.