Spray latex and Interstitial Lung Diseas
Howdie ALL,
About a month back, I was painting new doors my girlfriend had gotten for her house. I thought my HVLP conversion gun would come in real handy. And I thought her two car attached garage was just the perfect place to spray. (My shop doesn’t have enough room and would be too cold.) She has a split level house.
I’ll admit that the “overspray” hung in the air in the garage. We could also smell the latex fumes in the lower level. But I had painted in her house before, although it was with brushes and rollers without any bad effects. The girlfriend stayed out of the lower level while the painting was going on.
Well, a couple of weeks ago, she came down with what the doctor thought was double pneumonia. She had a CAT scan today and a pulminary function test yesterday. Her doctor thinks that it is interstitial lung disease.
It was about a week after spraying that she developed symptoms.
Have you good folks ever heard of such a thing before?
What do you guys think?
Could spraying latex cause ILD?
Any doctors or respiratory types out there with knowledge of other possible causes?
Thanks for your input.
I’ll post this on Breaktime too.
Replies
First, I'm not a Doctor.
Interstitial lung disease, if I recall, is an infection of the tissues which surround the lungs. The resulting inflammation causes the lungs to be squeezed a bit, restricting their function somewhat.
If her malady is what I recall, it used to be called walking pneumonia. It's a lot more serious than, for instance, a cold. But in an otherwise healthy individual, it's quite curable.
Unless you're the lead dog, the view just never changes.
Contact the paint manufacturer and get a copy of the Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS). They are required to send it to you. It will list the hazards and the type of precautions to take when using the product.
Lots of folks think that "waterbased" products are totally safe. This is not true. Many require appropriate respirators particularly when spraying.
Take a look at this article by the American Lung Association. A quick quote to get us off the pneumonia track:
I just took a quick glance at the article, but it appears ILD is a chronic disease. While the paint fumes may have aggravated her, I'd think something had been going on for awhile.
forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Another proud member of the "I Rocked With ToolDoc Club" .... :>)
Chills,
Interstitial lung disease is usually the result of prolonged exposure to inhaled substances. On radiographs, ILD shows as a wispy, cloudy area that, as the condition worsens, can cause lung impairment. Oftn the condition is discribed as pneumoconisis, or inflation of the area between the air cells of the lung. Past incidents of pneumonia can also show on radiographs and be described as ILD. Some occupational causes of ILD are expsoure to silica and asbestos.
I seriously doubt that the latex spary did anything more than maybe irritate the condition.
Doug
I'm no doc either, but it does sound as though your friend had a pre-existing condition that may have been aggravated by the fumes.
We do, however, have a doc (Biscardi) that frequents this forum, and if memory serves me correctly, he is a respiratory specialist. I will try to track him down with an email, and ask if he is willing to comment on this.
I hope your friend's condition is not serious.
Thank you everyone for replying.
She had a pulmonary functin test and a CAT scan last week. The results from that indicate that she may have had it for a while.
One of the effects of that lung condition is tiredness. This may explain why she was napping all of the time.
She'll be seeing a specialist soon.
Thanks again!
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