A member asked:

It's been a week and i still have a 10centimeter hole in my lung on february 3rd, 2012, i had an emergency pacemaker implanted and the surgery caused blood to fill up my left lung which collasped and after insertion of chest tubed it was drained and when

4 doctors weighed in across 2 answers

What : What you're calling a 10 cm "hole" is more likely a measurement of the distance between your lung and the chest wall. This space is occupied by air, which has leaked into that space and allowed the lung to partially collapse. This is called a pneumothorax. In most cases, pnuemothorax will go away with a chest tube, as yours did. Sometimes, the pneumothorax recurs after the tube is removed. If that happens, and its causing symptoms, one usually puts a tube back in. The fact that your pneumothorax has persisted for five days suggests that it will not go away by itself. You probably do need a new tube, which will need to be kept in place a bit longer than the previous one. This can take several days in some cases. If it still doesn't go away, the next step would be a minor surgical procedure.

Answered 10/3/2016

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Dr. Craig Carter answered

Specializes in Thoracic Surgery

Question?: It sounds like you had a hemothorax (blood in the chest) after a pacemaker insertion, which is a possible complication. The chest tube was placed to drain the blood. The site of the chest tube closes over time. A 10cm hole in your lung would pretty much span the entire lung width. If the chest tube has been removed, the situation should resolve.

Answered 1/2/2015

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