Please explain respiratory infection to me
June 14, 2023 10:48 AM Subscribe
I just recently got a nasty cold while traveling, and it made me wonder what all the symptoms actually mean and where all the different discharges actually come from.
What does clear snot vs yellow thick snot vs yellow or green phlegm mean? Does the thick yellow snot from my nose come from the same place the yellow stuff I'm coughing up? Is it from inside my lungs? What is causing my itchy throat cough? Upper vs lower respiratory infection?
I realized I've had the "common cold" for all my life but I actually don't know what is happening when it happens. I've had a lingering producing cough from the cold for over a week now, and it's making me wonder about it all.
What does clear snot vs yellow thick snot vs yellow or green phlegm mean? Does the thick yellow snot from my nose come from the same place the yellow stuff I'm coughing up? Is it from inside my lungs? What is causing my itchy throat cough? Upper vs lower respiratory infection?
I realized I've had the "common cold" for all my life but I actually don't know what is happening when it happens. I've had a lingering producing cough from the cold for over a week now, and it's making me wonder about it all.
I don't think it addresses all of your specific questions, but I'll once again plug Immune by Philipp Dettmer, which gives a very detailed picture of what the immune system does, striving to break it down in simple terms for us laypersons.
I liked the NIH article above, but one thing it didn't spell out very well is that the colors in your snot are partly due to it being full of immune cells (before I read Immune I would have called them "white blood cells") that are flooding the area to gobble up the pathogen. I believe the different colors reflect different stages of immune response. I once read in a news article that the color indicates what type of infection you have, but I've since seen that debunked.
posted by polecat at 1:31 PM on June 14, 2023
I liked the NIH article above, but one thing it didn't spell out very well is that the colors in your snot are partly due to it being full of immune cells (before I read Immune I would have called them "white blood cells") that are flooding the area to gobble up the pathogen. I believe the different colors reflect different stages of immune response. I once read in a news article that the color indicates what type of infection you have, but I've since seen that debunked.
posted by polecat at 1:31 PM on June 14, 2023
I just watched this video from Kurtzgesagt that gives nice illustrations of what symptoms mean...doesn't talk about phlegm, though.
posted by polecat at 1:52 PM on June 14, 2023
posted by polecat at 1:52 PM on June 14, 2023
What does clear snot vs yellow thick snot vs yellow or green phlegm mean?
An acquaintance is a Physician's Assistant, and she once told me that presenting with clear mucus pointed towards viral infection, and presenting with green/yellow pointed toward bacterial, and she prescribed antibiotics accordingly when she saw patients at urgent care.
posted by Back At It Again At Krispy Kreme at 3:41 PM on June 14, 2023
An acquaintance is a Physician's Assistant, and she once told me that presenting with clear mucus pointed towards viral infection, and presenting with green/yellow pointed toward bacterial, and she prescribed antibiotics accordingly when she saw patients at urgent care.
posted by Back At It Again At Krispy Kreme at 3:41 PM on June 14, 2023
^my doctor vehemently disagrees with the above re: bacterial vs viral.
posted by stray at 8:11 AM on January 27
posted by stray at 8:11 AM on January 27
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Marvels of Mucus and Phlegm (National Institutes of Health)
posted by AndrewInDC at 11:23 AM on June 14, 2023 [3 favorites]