Hi, I'm from the ovarian cancer board, but my mom has a plurex catheter and something weird just ha

ovarian_support
ovarian_support Member Posts: 44
in Lung Cancer #1

Warning, if you have a weak stomach please stop reading now, this is gross and not too much weirds me out. OK, so my mom has had the plurex catheter installed in her right plurel cavity maybe 2-3 weeks ago.  I set her up and do the draining which has steadly been decreasing over the past week.  Yesterday, we only got about 25ml from it, but we thought since we moved to a smaller bottle, maybe we were getting less suction.  Today since she was feeling more short of breath than she was yesterday she wanted to use the one large bottle we had left.  Also, she laid down on the couch for the draining instead of sitting at the table.  We got 375ml and found that more came on inhalation which makes sense.  There was no pain.  The weird part came when I went to empty the bottle, it wouldn't empty.  I tried widening the hole with my finger (fyi, i was wearing latex gloves) it had little effect.  We thought we could see something solid in the bottle, when I shoke the bottle gelatinous material started coming out, I pulled it out and we double bagged it and put it in a air tight container in the fridge to show to the doctor.  Naturally this happened at 5:45pm on a Friday.  We will call the doctor on Monday, but has anyone had this happen?  Is this normal?  My mother does feel much better after that.  It looks like clear tissue, but maybe it's part of the bottle we haven't seen.  Nothing about this in the FAQ of the plurex site, nothing in our instructions from the doctor.

Comments

  • dennycee
    dennycee Member Posts: 857 Member
    #2
    Did your mom have a wedge,

    Did your mom have a wedge, lobectomy or whole lung returned moved?  Because nature abhors a vacuum the body replaces the void created with a gel substance.  One of my friends says there are times it makes a bubbling like sound when she changes positions. Looking back over what you wrote I wonder, too, if she's had ascetes in the past.  If its something else, I would very much like to read what it is.  

    BTW, I had a pleurX cath and never experienced anything like this.  Wow. 

  • ovarian_support
    ovarian_support Member Posts: 44
    #3
    Thanks

    My mother has not have to had part of her lung removed.  I'm sorry I just copy and pasted my post to the ovarian cancer board where they know my mom's history.  She has stage iv ovarian cancer that has spread from the abdomen to the plueral cavity.  She did have acites at time of diagnosis which cleared up with her first treatment about 2 years ago and ct scan since then have showed no sign of acites.  The plurel effusion started with the first round of this treatment maybe 5 - 6 months ago.  Both sides were drained and it didin't come back until about 2 months ago. Her right plurel space was drained because it was worse than the left but the effusion returned witin days so they put in a plurex cath on the right side.  After a week or 2 she developed back pain on the left side.  Her left lung was nearly collapsed with the effusion around it.  This then was drained with the hope that it wouldn't come back about a week ago, she is started feeling short of breath here over the past couple of days.  It was 4 days ago that we pulled the gel out.  We havent' gotten any since.  Different sources say different things as to what causes it.  Some say that time can change the viscosity of the liquid and turn  it to gel, others say it could be cancer cells or signs of infection.  We saved it for analysis.  Today we got a lot of air bubbles; but little fluid.  Don't know what that is about.  Thank you for replying to my post.

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