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Dr. Andrew Rynne
MD
Dr. Andrew Rynne

Family Physician

Exp 50 years

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What Could Be The Cause For Snoring Sound During Waking Hours?

My mom is hospitalized from a stroke she had two and a half months ago. After the stroke she was intubated. They extubated her and she was making very loud sounds when she was breathing and awake that sounded like snoring and about three days afterwords she quit breathing and they had to emergently intubate her again. They then gave her a Trach and a oxygen collar. They recently capped her Trach, cause they re hoping that they can remove the Trach. Her oxygen is in the high 90s and she seems to be breathing pretty good, but it drops to 88 if she doesn t have the oxygen in her nose. She is making a snoring sound when she is awake and breathing and that worries me, cause she was making a snoring sound before when she was extubated and she quit breathing. It s not a real loud sound like it was before though. She also breathes a little harder (I see her stomach moving up and down a lot) when she makes the snoring sound. Also sometimes when she gets cleaned she had trouble breathing (she is in a lot of pain cause of her leg when they clean her and she gets upset and I think that makes her breathe hard) and the last time they cleaned her face turned pink and her lips started losing color. Should I be worried about the sound she is making or is that normal when capped? Does it mean she might quit breathing again? What about her having trouble breathing sometimes when she s cleaned? Do you think it s best to remove the trach or for her to keep it? Since her oxygen saturation drops without oxygen I m sure she will have to have oxygen the rest of her life with or without the Trach, so a part of me feels that I d like for her to just keep the Trach instead of removing it, to prevent her from having trouble breathing or stopping breathing again, but I want them to be able to remove the Trach if they can and if she ll be able to breathe ok without it and I m torn on what to do. The finial decision is up to me, cause I m making medical decisions for her.
Mon, 27 Jun 2016
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General & Family Physician 's  Response
after stroke depending on site of lesion muscles in the pharynx, larynx, or even tongue can lose neural innervation leading them to be weak. once they are weak they can obscure breathing pathway which will result in snoring sounds. She needs to be intubated until muscles innervation recovers, but its hard to give a time estimate for that, stroke recovery is variable. Its important to maintain blood oxygen level in the safe range.
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What Could Be The Cause For Snoring Sound During Waking Hours?

after stroke depending on site of lesion muscles in the pharynx, larynx, or even tongue can lose neural innervation leading them to be weak. once they are weak they can obscure breathing pathway which will result in snoring sounds. She needs to be intubated until muscles innervation recovers, but its hard to give a time estimate for that, stroke recovery is variable. Its important to maintain blood oxygen level in the safe range.