Pneumothorax in Young, Tall Adults and Athletes: Why It Happens and How Care Differs

A 19-year-old rower folds his six-foot-four frame into a lecture-hall seat, reaches for a pen, and feels something catch high under his right collarbone. Not the crushing chest pain of the movies. More like a stitch that will not move, followed by a breath that does not quite fill. He assumes he pulled something at practice. Three hours later a chest x-ray shows the top third of his right lung has fallen away from the chest wall. He has never smoked, never been sick, and has just met the textbook picture of pneumothorax in tall young adults.

His parents’ first question is the one almost every family asks: how does a healthy lung simply collapse? The second is whether he will ever row again. Both deserve straight answers.

What follows is the evidence on why this happens to tall, lean people and athletes, what the first hours and weeks usually involve, and why the treatment path for an otherwise healthy 19-year-old looks different from the path for a 70-year-old with emphysema.

What is a pneumothorax in tall young adults, and why does it happen?

A pneumothorax is air trapped in the pleural space, the thin gap between the lung and the inner chest wall. Normally that space holds only a film of fluid, and slight suction keeps the lung inflated against the ribs. When air leaks in, the suction is lost and part of the lung deflates. Doctors call this a collapsed lung, though in most young patients only a portion collapses, not the whole organ (MedlinePlus).

When it happens without an injury, a medical procedure or a known lung disease, it is called a primary spontaneous pneumothorax. This is the version that clusters in tall, slim people between roughly 20 and 40, more often men than women, as Mayo Clinic notes. A review in the New England Journal of Medicine put the annual incidence at about 7.4–18 per 100,000 men and 1.2–6 per 100,000 women, so it is uncommon but far from rare in an emergency department week.

The distinction from secondary spontaneous pneumothorax matters for everything that follows. A secondary pneumothorax happens in someone whose lungs are already damaged, usually by chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), cystic fibrosis or a similar condition. That person has little reserve, so even a small collapse can be dangerous. A tall 22-year-old with otherwise normal lungs can usually tolerate the same collapse comfortably, which is precisely why guidelines allow a gentler, more watchful approach in the younger group.

The word spontaneous is slightly misleading. The leak is spontaneous in the sense that nothing external caused it, but the underlying weakness in the lung tissue has usually been there for years, waiting.

How does a collapsed lung actually happen in someone with healthy lungs?

Picture the lung as a sponge sealed inside a thin, wet balloon. The balloon is the visceral pleura, the membrane that wraps the lung surface. In many tall young adults, tiny air-filled blisters called blebs form on that surface at the very top of the lung, where the pleura is stretched thinnest. A bleb is usually smaller than a pea. When one ruptures, air from the airways escapes into the pleural space and the lung sags away from the chest wall (Cleveland Clinic).

Why the top? Gravity. In an upright person the pleural pressure is more negative at the apex than at the base, because the weight of the lung pulls it downward. The taller the chest, the steeper that gradient and the more the apical tissue is stretched. The NEJM review describes this height-related gradient as the leading explanation for why lanky builds are over-represented, and why the leak nearly always starts high in the chest.

Rapid growth may add to the strain. During adolescent growth spurts the chest cage lengthens quickly, and some researchers suspect the lung tissue and blood supply lag behind, leaving the apex relatively underperfused and fragile. This remains a hypothesis rather than a proven mechanism, and the guideline literature is careful to describe it that way.

Once air is inside the pleural space, two things determine how a person feels: how much air leaked, and whether the hole seals. Most bleb ruptures seal themselves within hours. The body then reabsorbs the trapped air slowly, at a rate the British Thoracic Society guideline estimates at roughly 1.25–2.2% of the affected side’s volume per day, which is why full re-expansion of a moderate collapse can take weeks without intervention.

Spontaneous pneumothorax causes: why height, build, sex and smoking matter

Ask a chest physician to sketch the classic patient and the pencil moves quickly: young, male, tall, lean, often a smoker. Each feature has its own evidence.

Height and low body weight are the strongest physical associations. Mayo Clinic lists being tall and underweight among the recognized risk factors, and the pleural-pressure mechanism described above offers a plausible reason. Being lean matters partly because there is less soft tissue to buffer the chest wall, and partly because tall, thin body habitus tracks with the apical bleb pattern seen on CT scans.

Sex differences are large. The NEJM incidence figures show men affected several times more often than women, though a specific subtype called catamenial pneumothorax, linked to endometriosis and timed with menstruation, occurs almost exclusively in women in their thirties and forties (Cleveland Clinic).

Smoking is the single most powerful modifiable factor. The British Thoracic Society guideline cites data suggesting that a healthy man who smokes may carry a lifetime pneumothorax risk of about 12%, against roughly 0.1% for a never-smoker. The relationship is dose-dependent and includes cannabis smoking, which is often overlooked in a young patient’s history.

Inherited connective-tissue conditions round out the list. Marfan syndrome, Ehlers-Danlos syndrome and a rarer gene variant known as Birt-Hogg-Dubé all weaken the structural proteins of the lung surface. A family history of pneumothorax, a very tall build with long limbs, or lens problems in the eye are the sort of clues that prompt clinicians to consider these, since they change follow-up planning even though they do not change first-day treatment (Johns Hopkins Medicine).

Collapsed lung in athletes: does exercise cause it?

This is where a common assumption falls apart. Because the classic patient is a young athlete, families often conclude that a hard training session caused the collapse. The evidence points the other way. The British Thoracic Society guideline states that most spontaneous pneumothoraces occur at rest, not during exertion. Our rower’s lecture-hall moment is typical; the bleb ruptured while he was sitting still.

Why, then, do athletes appear so often in case reports? Selection, mostly. Sports that reward height and lean mass, such as rowing, basketball, volleyball and distance running, recruit exactly the body type that carries apical blebs. The sport does not create the weakness; it gathers the people who already have it.

Two caveats deserve mention. Heavy lifting with breath-holding, the Valsalva maneuver, briefly spikes pressure inside the airways, and individual reports link it to bleb rupture. Contact and collision sports add a separate risk: a direct blow can cause a traumatic pneumothorax, which is a different condition with its own management and is not the subject of this article (MedlinePlus).

What athletes and coaches should take from the evidence is subtler than a ban. A sudden one-sided chest pain with unexplained breathlessness, whether on the field or on the sofa, warrants same-day assessment rather than stretching it out. Fit young people compensate remarkably well, so symptoms can seem out of proportion to how well the person looks. A chest x-ray, not a training log, answers the question.

Return-to-sport decisions after a first episode rest on the treating team’s judgment. There is no high-quality trial telling athletes when to resume, which is why guidance leans on full radiographic re-expansion and symptom resolution first.

How is a pneumothorax diagnosed, and why does size matter so much?

Diagnosis is usually quick. A clinician listens for reduced breath sounds on one side and taps the chest for the hollow note of trapped air, then orders an upright chest x-ray. On the film, the collapsed lung shows as a fine white line with airless black space between it and the ribs (Mayo Clinic). Bedside ultrasound is increasingly used in emergency departments and can spot a pneumothorax in seconds, though x-ray remains the standard for measuring it. CT scanning is reserved for uncertain cases, suspected underlying disease or surgical planning, since it also reveals blebs on the opposite lung.

Size drives the treatment conversation. The British Thoracic Society method measures the gap between lung edge and chest wall at the level of the hilum, the point where the airways enter the lung. Under 2 cm is small; 2 cm or more is large. That small measurement translates to a surprising volume: a 2 cm rim represents roughly half the lung on that side, because the lung is a three-dimensional structure and the outer shell holds most of the volume.

Size is not the whole story. Guidelines increasingly emphasize symptoms and overall stability over centimeters. A tall young adult with a large collapse who is breathing comfortably, with normal oxygen levels, is treated differently from someone of the same size who is struggling. The New England Journal of Medicine trial of conservative care, discussed below, enrolled people aged 14–50 with moderate to large collapses and showed that many could be safely observed, which shifted the field toward asking how the patient is doing rather than only how the x-ray looks.

Blood tests add little in a straightforward case. Oxygen saturation, pulse and blood pressure are the numbers clinicians watch.

How does care differ for pneumothorax in tall young adults compared with older patients?

The single most important idea in this article is that a healthy young lung buys time. A person with emphysema has almost no spare capacity, so guidelines send most of those patients straight to a chest drain and admission. A tall 24-year-old with normal lungs can often tolerate a moderate collapse, which opens up gentler options (British Thoracic Society guideline, via PubMed).

Question	Primary spontaneous (healthy young adult)	Secondary spontaneous (underlying lung disease)
Typical patient	Tall, slim, 20–40, often a smoker	Older, COPD, cystic fibrosis or other lung disease
Small collapse, few symptoms	Observation, often as outpatient with early review	Usually admitted; observation only if very small and stable
Large or symptomatic collapse	Needle aspiration first; drain if that fails, or observation in selected cases	Chest drain usually first-line
Hospital stay	Frequently avoided or short	Commonly several days
Surgery timing	Usually after recurrence or persistent leak	Considered earlier because of low reserve

Three care pathways are now recognized for the young group. Observation means no procedure at all, with repeat x-rays and clear instructions on when to return. Needle aspiration means drawing air out through a fine catheter and removing it the same day. A chest drain, also called an intercostal tube, is a soft tube left in place for hours to days, connected to a one-way valve so air can leave but not re-enter (Cleveland Clinic).

The NEJM conservative-management trial compared observation with intervention in 316 young adults with moderate-to-large primary pneumothorax. By eight weeks the lung had re-expanded in 94.4% of the observation group and 98.5% of the intervention group, a difference the authors judged within their non-inferiority margin, while the observation group had fewer serious adverse events and shorter hospital stays. About 15% of those observed eventually needed a procedure. Those numbers explain why watchful waiting is now a legitimate option rather than a fallback.

What actually happens during observation, needle aspiration or a chest drain?

Patients tend to fear the procedures more than the condition, so it helps to know what each involves in plain terms.

Observation. You sit or recline while nursing staff check oxygen levels and breathing rate over a few hours. Some units give oxygen through a mask, which speeds the reabsorption of trapped air; the British Thoracic Society guideline reports that high-flow oxygen can increase the resorption rate roughly fourfold. A repeat x-ray confirms the collapse is not growing. If it is stable and you are comfortable, many services allow discharge with a review appointment and written return instructions (Mayo Clinic).

Needle aspiration. After local anesthetic numbs a spot on the chest, usually below the collarbone or at the side, a thin catheter passes between the ribs into the pleural space. Air is withdrawn by syringe until resistance is felt or a set volume is reached, then the catheter comes out. It takes about as long as a blood draw plus waiting time, and a follow-up x-ray shows whether the lung has re-expanded. The guideline recommends this before a drain for symptomatic primary pneumothorax because it works in a substantial share of young patients and avoids admission.

Chest drain. If aspiration fails or the collapse is large and the person is unwell, a soft tube is placed under local anesthetic into the same space and secured with a stitch. It connects to a bottle with a water seal or a small valve. You can walk with it. The tube stays until the lung is fully up and bubbling stops, typically a day or several. Removal is quick and done at the bedside (MedlinePlus).

Ambulatory drains with a compact valve now let some patients go home with a tube in place. Availability varies, and suitability is a judgment for the treating team.

Who is usually offered watchful waiting, and who is asked to wait for surgery?

The decision tree in most guidelines starts with two questions: is this a primary or secondary pneumothorax, and how is the person breathing?

Observation without a procedure is generally offered to young, otherwise healthy people whose collapse is small, or whose collapse is larger but who have minimal breathlessness, normal oxygen levels and a stable pulse. The NEJM trial showed this works for a broad slice of primary cases, though it also showed that roughly one in seven will still need intervention, so observation is a plan with a safety net rather than a promise (PubMed).

A first-line procedure, usually aspiration, is offered when symptoms are significant or the rim exceeds 2 cm and the person prefers active management. A chest drain becomes the choice when aspiration fails, when oxygen levels are low, or when the collapse is bilateral. Anyone with signs of tension pneumothorax, a rare emergency where trapped air compresses the heart and the other lung, is decompressed immediately regardless of any algorithm (Cleveland Clinic).

Who is asked to wait? People who want surgery after a first uncomplicated episode are usually asked to hold off. The British Thoracic Society guideline reserves definitive surgery for a second episode on the same side, a first episode on the opposite side, both lungs at once, a persistent air leak of several days, or occupations where recurrence would be dangerous, such as pilots and divers. The logic is that roughly two in three people never have a second episode, so operating on everyone would expose many to surgical risk for no benefit.

Pregnancy, connective-tissue disorders and a very strong family history push the discussion earlier. Those are exactly the situations to raise with the specialist rather than assume.

What do the days and weeks after a pneumothorax usually look like?

Recovery has a rhythm, and knowing it lowers anxiety.

In the first 24–48 hours, most people feel a dull ache on the affected side and a sense that a deep breath is not quite complete. That is normal. Pain relief prescribed by the team, slow deep breathing and gentle walking help. If a drain was placed, the tube usually stays until the lung is fully expanded on x-ray and has stopped leaking, commonly one to a few days (Mayo Clinic). After removal the small wound is covered and heals over a week or two.

Follow-up typically means a repeat chest x-ray. The British Thoracic Society guideline suggests review within two to four weeks for those managed conservatively, and earlier review, often within a few days, if a person was discharged after aspiration. The x-ray confirms the lung has stayed up; the visit is also where lifestyle questions get answered.

Gradual return to ordinary activity is the norm. Walking and light chores can resume once you are home and comfortable. Guidance differs on strenuous exercise, and the honest summary is that the evidence base is thin: most clinicians advise waiting until the x-ray is normal and symptoms have gone, then building back over weeks rather than days. Heavy lifting with breath-holding and contact sports are the activities most often deferred longest.

Smoking cessation is the single intervention with the best evidence for changing the future, and clinicians will raise it. Quitting substantially lowers recurrence risk according to the guideline, though it does not eliminate the underlying bleb tendency.

Emotionally, the weeks after can be harder than the event. Many young patients describe hyper-vigilance about every twinge. That settles for most people, and it is worth naming to the care team.

Pneumothorax recurrence risk: how likely is a second collapse, and when is surgery considered?

Recurrence is the question that hangs over every follow-up visit. The New England Journal of Medicine review reports a wide range in published studies, roughly 16–52%, with most estimates clustering around one in three within the first few years. Most recurrences happen on the same side within one to two years. Continued smoking, taller height and CT evidence of many blebs each raise the odds; quitting lowers them (British Thoracic Society guideline).

Interestingly, the NEJM conservative-management trial reported a lower recurrence rate at 12 months in people who were observed rather than drained, 8.8% versus 16.8%. The authors were cautious about the finding, since it was a secondary outcome, and it should be read as intriguing rather than settled.

Surgery aims to stop recurrence, and the usual operation is video-assisted thoracoscopic surgery (VATS), keyhole surgery through two or three small cuts using a camera. The surgeon removes the blebs, a step called bullectomy, and then encourages the lung surface to stick to the chest wall so air cannot collect again, a step called pleurodesis. Pleurodesis can be mechanical, by roughening the lining, or chemical, by placing an irritant powder; some surgeons also remove a strip of the lining, called pleurectomy (Johns Hopkins Medicine).

The guideline cites recurrence after VATS pleurodesis of around 5%, higher than the roughly 1% after traditional open surgery, but with less pain and faster recovery. Which technique, and whether to operate at all, is a surgical judgment.

Chemical pleurodesis through an existing chest drain, without surgery, is an alternative for people unfit for an operation. It is less effective at preventing recurrence and is mainly used in the secondary group.

Triggers for a surgical referral, as summarized by the guideline, are: a second episode on the same side, a first episode on the other side, simultaneous bilateral collapse, an air leak persisting beyond about three to five days, and high-risk occupations.

Flying after pneumothorax, scuba diving and returning to sport

Cabin pressure is the issue with flying. At cruising altitude the cabin is pressurized to roughly the equivalent of 1,800–2,400 meters, so any pocket of trapped gas in the body expands. If a pneumothorax is still present, that expansion can turn a stable collapse into a dangerous one. The British Thoracic Society guideline advises against air travel while any pneumothorax remains and suggests waiting until a chest x-ray confirms full resolution, with a further interval of about one week after that film. Individual airlines and aviation medical services may ask for longer, and anyone with a recent episode should confirm with the treating team and the carrier before booking (Mayo Clinic).

Diving is different in kind. A diver ascending with a small leak faces rapid gas expansion in the chest, and the consequences can be catastrophic. The guideline recommends that diving be discouraged permanently after a spontaneous pneumothorax unless a person has had bilateral surgical pleurectomy and has normal lung function and a normal CT scan afterward. Professional and military diving bodies have their own rules that are often stricter.

Altitude sports such as mountaineering and skiing at height carry a lesser version of the flying concern and are worth discussing case by case.

For most sports the evidence is reassuring but incomplete. No trial has defined a safe interval, so recommendations rest on physiology and experience: wait for radiographic resolution, wait for symptoms to settle, then rebuild gradually. Non-contact endurance and skill sports are usually resumed sooner than heavy lifting or collision sports. Athletes at elite level, where recurrence would mean a season lost, sometimes discuss earlier surgical referral with their specialist; the guideline recognizes occupation as a factor, and a comparable argument can be made for career athletes, though that is a shared decision rather than a rule.

What people often get wrong about pneumothorax

Myth: the whole lung collapses. In most primary cases only a portion deflates, often the upper part. The image of a lung shriveled to nothing applies mainly to tension pneumothorax, which is rare in healthy young adults (MedlinePlus).

Myth: it was caused by the workout. Most episodes begin at rest. The sport gathered the tall, lean body type; it did not create the bleb (British Thoracic Society guideline).

Myth: every pneumothorax needs a chest drain. The NEJM trial showed that many moderate-to-large primary collapses in people aged 14–50 can be safely observed, with fewer complications than routine intervention. Drains remain essential for some, but they are no longer automatic.

Myth: once it heals, the risk is gone. Published recurrence estimates range from about 16% to 52%, so roughly a third of people will have another episode, most within two years. That is why follow-up, smoking cessation and knowing the warning signs matter more than the first-day treatment.

Myth: surgery is a simple fix everyone should have. Surgery lowers recurrence substantially but does not eliminate it, carries its own risks, and is generally reserved for defined situations. Operating on every first episode would expose two in three people to surgery they did not need.

Myth: it only happens to smokers. Smoking raises lifetime risk dramatically, but tall never-smokers with apical blebs account for a meaningful share of cases, especially in the youngest patients (Mayo Clinic).

Myth: a normal x-ray means you can fly tomorrow. Guidelines add a waiting interval after documented resolution, and carriers may ask for more.

Myth: shortness of breath must be severe for it to be a collapsed lung. Fit young adults compensate so well that mild breathlessness with sharp one-sided pain is the more usual picture, which is why it is so often mistaken for a pulled muscle.

Questions to ask your care team

A pneumothorax visit moves fast, and the useful questions tend to surface in the car on the way home. These are the ones patients and families most often wish they had asked, grouped by the moment they arise.

At diagnosis

• Is this a primary or secondary pneumothorax, and what does that mean for my options?
• How large is the collapse, and how are you measuring it?
• Am I a candidate for observation without a procedure, and what would make you change that plan?
• If you recommend aspiration or a drain, what does the procedure involve and how long might the tube stay?

Before going home

• What symptoms should bring me straight back to the emergency department?
• When and where is my follow-up x-ray?
• Who do I call if I have questions between now and then?
• Do I need a CT scan to look for blebs, or for anything on the other side?

At follow-up

• What is my personal recurrence risk given my height, smoking history and scan findings?
• Should I be assessed for a connective-tissue condition given my build or family history?
• When can I return to my sport, and which activities should I defer longest?
• What is the guidance on flying and altitude for me, and how do I document resolution for an airline?
• Is diving ever going to be an option, and under what conditions?

If it happens again

• Does this episode meet the usual criteria for surgical referral?
• What operation would be considered, what are its risks, and what recurrence rate does the evidence quote for it?
• Are there non-surgical alternatives, and how do they compare?

Write the answers down or ask permission to record them. The decisions belong to you and your treating team, and good decisions are easier with the answers in one place.

When to call your doctor

Most young adults recover from a spontaneous pneumothorax without drama, but two situations demand urgency, and knowing the difference is part of going home safely.

Call emergency services or go to the nearest emergency department now if you have:

• Sudden, worsening shortness of breath, especially if you cannot speak a full sentence
• Chest pain that is rapidly increasing or spreading
• Blue or gray lips or fingertips
• A racing heartbeat with lightheadedness, fainting or confusion
• Swelling of the neck or face, or a crackling feeling under the skin of the chest
• Symptoms on the opposite side from a previous collapse

These can signal a tension pneumothorax, where trapped air builds pressure and squeezes the heart and the other lung. It is rare in primary cases but it is a true emergency (Cleveland Clinic). Do not drive yourself.

Contact your doctor or the team that treated you the same day if you notice:

• Return of the sharp one-sided pain or breathlessness you had at the start, even if mild
• Fever, or redness, warmth or discharge at a drain or aspiration site
• A persistent cough that is new since discharge
• Breathlessness that is not improving week on week

Before you travel, call to confirm your follow-up x-ray has shown full resolution and to ask about the waiting interval for flying. The British Thoracic Society guideline advises no air travel until resolution is documented, with a further period after that (Mayo Clinic).

A brief word on the people around you: tell a roommate, teammate or family member what happened and what the red-flag signs are. Young, fit people are good at minimizing symptoms. A second set of eyes that knows to insist on the emergency department is a genuine safety measure. Every decision about treatment, follow-up and return to activity rests with your treating team, and they would rather hear from you unnecessarily than not at all.

Frequently asked questions

Why does pneumothorax happen in tall young adults more than others?

Height steepens the pressure gradient inside the chest, stretching the lung’s thin outer membrane most at the apex, where tiny air blisters called blebs form and can rupture. Tall, lean builds carry this pattern more often, and men are affected several times more frequently than women. Smoking multiplies the risk substantially. The exact reason blebs develop in some tall people and not others is not fully understood.

What are the main spontaneous pneumothorax causes in an otherwise healthy person?

Rupture of an apical bleb is the usual cause in a healthy young adult. Contributing factors include tall, slim build, male sex, tobacco or cannabis smoking, and inherited connective-tissue conditions such as Marfan syndrome. In women, a form linked to endometriosis can occur around menstruation. Injury, medical procedures and underlying lung disease cause other types of pneumothorax that are managed differently.

Is a collapsed lung in athletes caused by training?

Usually not. Guideline evidence shows most spontaneous pneumothoraces begin at rest rather than during exertion. Athletes appear often in case reports because sports such as rowing and basketball select for the tall, lean body type that carries blebs. Heavy lifting with breath-holding has been linked in individual reports, and direct blows in contact sports can cause a separate traumatic pneumothorax.

How is a pneumothorax in young adults treated differently from older patients?

Younger patients with healthy lungs have more reserve, so guidelines allow observation without a procedure for many small and even some larger collapses, and recommend needle aspiration before a chest drain when treatment is needed. Older patients with lung disease usually go straight to a chest drain and hospital admission, and are considered for surgery earlier because a recurrence would be more dangerous for them.

What is the pneumothorax recurrence risk after a first episode?

Published estimates range from roughly 16% to 52%, with most clustering around one in three. Most recurrences occur on the same side within one to two years. Continued smoking, greater height and multiple blebs on CT raise the odds; stopping smoking lowers them. After keyhole surgery with pleurodesis, recurrence is reported at around 5%, according to the British Thoracic Society guideline.

How long does it take a collapsed lung to heal without treatment?

Trapped air is reabsorbed slowly, at roughly 1.25–2.2% of the affected side’s volume per day according to the British Thoracic Society guideline, so a small collapse may resolve over one to a few weeks. In a randomized trial of young adults observed without a procedure, the lung had re-expanded in 94.4% by eight weeks. Supplemental oxygen can speed reabsorption. Your team will confirm resolution with a repeat x-ray.

When is flying after pneumothorax considered safe?

Not until a chest x-ray confirms the pneumothorax has completely resolved. The British Thoracic Society guideline suggests waiting a further week after that film before air travel, because cabin pressure at altitude expands any trapped gas. Some airlines and aviation medical services require longer. Confirm timing with your treating team and carry documentation of resolution when you travel.

Can I ever scuba dive again after a spontaneous pneumothorax?

Guidelines discourage diving permanently after a spontaneous pneumothorax because gas expansion during ascent could be catastrophic. The British Thoracic Society guideline describes an exception only for people who have undergone bilateral surgical pleurectomy and have normal lung function and a normal chest CT afterward. Professional and military diving authorities often apply stricter rules. This is a decision for your specialist, not a general rule.

When is surgery recommended for a pneumothorax?

Surgery is generally reserved for a second episode on the same side, a first episode on the opposite side, both lungs collapsing at once, an air leak that persists beyond several days, or occupations such as piloting or diving where recurrence would be hazardous. The usual operation is keyhole removal of blebs with pleurodesis to make the lung adhere to the chest wall. The decision rests with the treating team.

What symptoms should send me to the emergency department after a pneumothorax?

Sudden or worsening shortness of breath, rapidly increasing chest pain, blue or gray lips, a racing heartbeat with faintness or confusion, or swelling of the neck and face require emergency care immediately; these can signal a tension pneumothorax. Milder return of the original one-sided pain or breathlessness, fever, or problems at a drain site should prompt a same-day call to your treating team.

References

• MedlinePlus: Collapsed lung (pneumothorax)
• Cleveland Clinic: Collapsed lung (pneumothorax)

This article is for general information only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice. Please consult a qualified doctor about your individual situation.