The best position to sleep in with pulmonary fibrosis is to sleep with your head higher than your body and lay on your side.
You should also use a wedge or pillows to keep you in this position as doing so opens your airway and helps you breathe.
The best treatment for pulmonary fibrosis is medications such as nintedanib (Ofev) and pirfenidone (Esbriet) which are two FDA approved medications for treatment of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.
An experimental anticancer drug called saracatinib also shows promise as a treatment for Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF), a chronic and often fatal condition that causes scarring or fibrosis of the lungs and makes breathing difficult.
You can also get a lung transplant for pulmonary fibrosis.
A lung transplant for Pulmonary Fibrosis can improve life expectancy and quality of life.
There has been a steady improvement internationally in the number of years' people survive post-transplant in the past 20 years.
The median life expectancy after bilateral sequential lung transplantation is just under eight years.
Pulmonary fibrosis is a lung disease that occurs when lung tissue becomes damaged and scarred.
A diagnosis of PF can be very scary.
When you do your research, you may see average survival is between three to five years.
This number is an average.
There are people who live less than three years after diagnosis, and others who live much longer.
The first signs of pulmonary fibrosis include.
Shortness of breath, particularly during exercise.
Dry, hacking cough.
Fast, shallow breathing.
Gradual unintended weight loss.
Tiredness.
Aching joints and muscles.
Clubbing (widening and rounding) of the tips of the fingers or toes.
Exposure to toxins like asbestos, coal dust or silica (including workers in the coal mining and sandblasting industry) can lead to pulmonary fibrosis.
The lung scarring that occurs in pulmonary fibrosis can't be reversed, and no current treatment has proved effective in stopping progression of the disease.
Some treatments may improve symptoms temporarily or slow the disease's progression.
Others may help improve quality of life.
Certain medications (amiodarone, bleomycin, nitrofurantoin, to name a few) list pulmonary fibrosis as a side-effect.