Anyone who is unfortunate enough to be diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis, also known as interstitial lung disease, knows how horrible this condition can be. The disease causes scarring and damage to lung tissue and can lead to debilitating symptoms and even death. Often times lung doctors make the diagnosis of “idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis” when they don’t know the cause of the lung fibrosis. The National Cancer Institute defines an idiopathic disease as “a disease of unknown cause.” The simple fact is that sometimes busy doctors don’t take careful occupational histories from their patients to learn about their dust and fume exposures, especially when the exposures happened many years and decades ago. As a result, these treating doctors may diagnose idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis when there is a likely culprit causing the pulmonary fibrosis: long-term exposure to workplace dusts, fumes, and lung toxins.
One reason it is so important for workers to know that their exposures to these substances is dangerous, is that there is no cure for pulmonary fibrosis. As such, persons who have been diagnosed with this disease should avoid any further dust or fume exposure which could exacerbate or aggravate their condition.
What are the symptoms of pulmonary fibrosis?
The symptoms of pulmonary fibrosis are identical to the symptoms of idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis and include:
- Shortness of breath
- Dry cough
- Chest pain
- Tiredness
- Clubbing (the rounding and widening of the tips of fingers and toes)
- Muscle and joint aches
What is the treatment for pulmonary fibrosis?
There is no cure for this disease. However, certain treatments can help slow its progression or alleviate symptoms, including medications such as OFEV (also known as nintedanib), supplemental oxygen, or in advanced cases, lung transplantation.
What are the causes of pulmonary fibrosis?
There are many different causes of pulmonary fibrosis. Sometimes the condition can be caused by another disease that is capable of causing lung damage, such as rheumatoid arthritis or scleroderma. Other times the condition can be found in certain families where parents and siblings also suffer from the condition. Unfortunately, a large number of railroad work exposures can cause pulmonary fibrosis, including:
- Asbestos
- Silica
- Ballast dust
- Diesel exhaust
- Welding fumes
- Wood dust
Anyone who has worked as a railroad engineer, brakeman, track worker, signal department worker, carman, welder, machinist, or electrician will immediately recognize that all of these dusts and fumes can be found in railroad work environments. It is for that reason that Doran and Murphy PLLC has successfully represented so many railroad workers over the years for pulmonary fibrosis, lung diseases, and cancer. Many times these rail workers have been diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, only because their doctors did not know the full extent of the railroad workplace exposures to dusts and fumes which are huge risk factors for the development of occupational pulmonary fibrosis. In such cases, these same doctors, after learning about the dust and fume exposure, will often give the opinion that the pulmonary fibrosis was caused and/or contributed to by railroad work exposures.
If you or a loved one have been diagnosed with pulmonary fibrosis or idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, call the railroad injury attorneys at Doran and Murphy to find out how you can obtain compensation for your condition under the Federal Employers Liability Act, or FELA. Pulmonary fibrosis caused by railroad dust and fume exposure was and is preventable. If the railroad had warned employees about these exposures, required the use of wet-down procedures, and provided adequate breathing protection, the exposures could have been avoided. All of these industrial hygiene and safety techniques were well-known to the nation’s railroads all the way back to the 1930s!