What is the cause of pulmonary fibrosis?

What is pulmonary interstitial fibrosis? Simply put, this disease is a type of respiratory disease. Clinically, it is generally believed that this disease is caused by the transformation of long-term chronic lung disease. The symptoms are similar to asthma. When the disease occurs, there will be difficulty breathing, shortness of breath, dry cough, etc. In addition, being in an environment with dust, toxic and harmful gases frequently can also lead to the onset of this disease.

Causes of pulmonary fibrosis

Causes in Traditional Chinese Medicine

Traditional Chinese medicine believes that pulmonary interstitial fibrosis is mostly secondary to many chronic lung diseases that have not been cured for a long time. Its causes can be divided into the following two categories:

1. Lung dryness and loss of body fluid are mostly caused by lung disease and severe loss of qi and yin, such as tuberculosis, lung abscess, diabetes, etc. Or warmth and heat may damage body fluid, or improper treatment may damage yin, which may seriously damage the lung and stomach fluid, leading to dryness of the lung fluid, loss of nourishment of the lung lobes, and formation of pulmonary emphysema.

2. Lung Qi deficiency and cold internal injuries, long-term cough or cold asthma, serious illness for a long time, depletion of Yang Qi, resulting in deficiency and coldness in the lungs. There are also cases where it is caused by deficiency-heat lung atrophy that does not heal for a long time, which damages the yin and yang and causes cold.

Western medicine causes and classification

1. Unexplained causes include idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, desquamative interstitial pneumonia, chronic granulocytic pneumonia, histiocytosis X, pulmonary alveolar proteinosis, sarcoidosis, etc.

2. Those with clear reasons

(1) Drug-induced: Commonly caused by anti-tumor drugs and bleomycin, methotrexate, cyclophosphamide, etc., antibacterial drugs such as furadine, penicillins, tetracyclines, para-aminosalicylic acid, ethamiodarone, phenytoin sodium, penicillamine, etc.

(2) Inhalation of organic dust: mainly caused by inhalation of dust contaminated with actinomycetes and mold. Common types of diseases include farmer's lung, sugarcane pneumoconiosis, mushroom lung, mint lung, humidifier lung, air-conditioning lung, etc., especially chronic exogenous allergic alveolitis.

(3) Inhalation of harmful gases: such as inhalation of fumes of nitric acid, sulfuric acid, hydrochloric acid, toxic gases and solvent gases, etc., whether acutely inhaled in large quantities or chronically inhaled in small quantities, can lead to this disease.

(4) Infectious: bacteria, fungi, viruses, mycoplasma, Legionella pneumophila, parasites, etc.

(5) Radiation damage: such as radiation pneumonia.

(5) Radiation damage: such as radiation pneumonia.