PT Health Life – Sore throat is a common symptom of many diseases, but that’s why many people are subjective, leading to being hospitalized in an emergency situation due to complications of sore throat.
1. Development of sore throat
Sore throat has many causes but is often due to throat infections caused by bacteria, viruses, fungi… Sore throat includes many different forms such as pharyngitis, uvulitis, laryngitis (including both vocal cords).
Depending on the cause of the disease, the symptoms of a sore throat are different. However, in general, when a sore throat occurs, patients often feel itchy, burning, dry, or even painful in the throat area. In some cases, the mucous membranes of the throat and palate are still red, swollen, edematous, and pus-filled. In particular, every time the patient talks or eats, these signs are even worse.
Some patients also have accompanying symptoms such as cough , chills, fever, congestion of the nasal mucosa, runny nose, sneezing, hoarseness, swollen lymph nodes in the neck, difficulty swallowing, and decreased appetite.
Sore throat symptoms will usually go away within 3-5 days after treatment or the body can adjust itself.
However, in some special cases such as high bacterial toxins, decreased body resistance, throat infections spread to the entire neck area, causing widespread inflammation in the neck and chest area, in some cases spreading down. mediastinum. Or severe infections can cause poisoning… this is also an ENT emergency.
2. Can cause sepsis…even death
According to records, the presence of pathogenic bacteria in these cases is staphylococcus, streptococcus, spirochetes, anaerobic and aerobic bacteria, including group A beta-hemolytic streptococcus.
When sore throat causes complications: the patient shows increasing pain in the throat, difficulty opening the mouth, gradually leading to tight jaw. Continuous sore throat while still using antibiotics. The level of pain in the throat decreased in the first day or two then increased more and more severely.
Characteristics of sore throat in peritonsillar abscess are pain spreading to the ear when swallowing, pain in the jaw angle area. The patient feels difficulty swallowing, saliva flows a lot, is dirty, and has bad breath. When the infection spreads, the patient’s voice changes, his voice sounds like he has a grain in his mouth, and it is difficult to hear due to the narrowing of the throat.
In the late stage, when the abscess spreads to the masseter muscle area, it will cause tight jaw. Difficulty breathing appears when the abscess fills the mouth and throat, gradually spreading down the larynx. Difficulty breathing is often rapid and shallow, pulse is small and difficult to detect.
The whole body shows signs of severe infection or infection accompanied by poisoning: High fever of 39-40ºC, chills, blue-gray skin.
If inflammation in the neck area is not detected and treated promptly, it can spread into the posterior organ space, abscesses spread into the mediastinum, lungs, sepsis… and even death, which is very dangerous.
3. When to see a doctor if you have a sore throat?
Most of the time, sore throat is benign, but the patient is not subjective. So what should you do if you have a sore throat?
First of all, you need to see a doctor specializing in ear, nose and throat to find the correct cause to cure the disease quickly, especially when the following characteristics are present:
- Sore throat gets worse and worse.
- The illness does not improve after 3 days.
- Fever above 39 degrees Celsius but lasting more than 2 days.
- Shortness of breath.
- If you have or have had bronchial asthma, heart disease, diabetes, HIV, are pregnant… you are at risk if complications due to sore throat occur.
4. Treat sore throat
Regarding treatment, it also depends on the specific patient’s case. Most people with sore throat can be advised by a doctor to treat it at home, without needing to be hospitalized, and can carefully ask the doctor for additional support with methods such as: :
Gargle with diluted warm salt water. Drink warm drinks such as honey tea, lemon water, or herbal tea to relieve a sore throat. Use lozenges. Syrup reduces cough and sore throat. Limit talking.
In severe cases, doctors treat medical treatment combined with surgery (wide incision to drain pus). Medical treatment with antibiotics combined according to the antibiogram, against both aerobic and anaerobic bacteria by intravenous infusion, antipyretic, analgesic, and anti-inflammatory. The treatment period lasts at least 10 days.
To prevent complications, patients need to be examined and treated for sore throat as prescribed by a specialist. You should not buy medicine to use on your own or use it incorrectly, not in the correct way or time of taking it as prescribed by your doctor. If the patient detects that the intermediate stage between acute tonsillitis and peritonsillar abscess is inflammation around the tonsils, that is very important, avoiding the patient having to undergo surgical intervention and treatment time. shortened. In the period of inflammation around the tonsils, it is enough to use high doses of antibiotics and anti-inflammatories orally or by injection to reduce fever and pain, and the patient will usually be cured in about a week.
