What causes chest pain and fever after altitude travel?
Patient: Hello, I recently traveled up to Mammoth (elevation between 7900 - 8900 ft) for the Memorial Day Weekend. We arrived on Friday evening. I felt fine all day Saturday and Sunday. After going in to bed on Sunday night I was restless and had a hard time sleeping. I started shivering and had chills. I think I started to scare myself and started having some anxiety which was making me feel like I wasn t breathing right - though I know I wasn t really breathless, didn t have shortness of breath nor was my heart rate irregular. I ended up taking my temperature at it was just under 100 degrees (normal for me is in the 97-low 98 degrees). I could tell my temperature rose a bit more as I got really warm then sweaty. I felt very dehydrated and kept drinking a lot of fluids. I was somewhat dizzy and felt a slighly nauseated. I couldn t sleep for most of the night. I took some ibuprofin and finally dosed off around 4 in the morning. I woke up around 6/7 am and didn t feel any better. My fever had come back (still low grade) and then I had a headache and body aches. I did start having some chest tightness and aches in my chest area too - similar to when my asthma acts up. As the morning went on I felt a little bit better but still had a headache, body aches and low grade fever. We left the area around noon and went back home (which is close to sea level). I felt much better still had some of the symptoms. My fever rose to almost 101 during the night (last night) but dropped after taking ibuprofin this morning. I still have had a slight headache but it and the aches have improved. Temperature hasn t risen since the night again. Question - does this sound more like a flu or virus or could it have been altitude sickness? or something else? Some of the symptoms sound like it could have been but not sure since I did have a fever and it came on after 48 hrs of being at that elevation (we slept at the lower elevation). Doctor: Hi,  Your chest pain and fever look more like flu than altitude sickness, when fever is present body aches will be there and heart activity will be increased so that chest tightness and pain you have felt.   Your headache also favours more towards flu, just if you get another episode of same just consult a physician.  Hope I have answered your query. Let me know if I can assist you further.  Take care  Regards, Dr Pusarla Naga Sai Lakshmi, Cardiac Surgeon