Pain on deep exhales

[yariss]

Hi,

I have been having discomfort from the left side of my breast bone up to my left shoulder.  It occurs when I exhale deeply and intensifies when I look downward, or slump.

I saw my doctor about it, though he was on vacation and got a fill-in, and he took 2 chest x-rays.  He and the specialist both said it was normal.  He said that it was probably due to a severe chest cold / flu I had in Feb.  This meeting was in early May / late April.  The doctor also said that it would take a while to get rid of.  It is now July and it still bugs me.  I have told others about this, and everyone raises and eyebrow about it as do I.  I have never heard of a flu getting into your cartilage or bone and staying around this long.  I don't have problems when I run (as I jog 2.5 miles 3 times a week) just when I exhale.

I thought that it could be the way I sleep due to me lying on my left side with my arm under my wifes pillow.  Just a thought.  I have not done any chest or upper body workouts since the MD visit.

Any thoughts?

[National Jewish Health]

Your doctor could be right to the extent of suggesting that your pain is musculoskeletal, meaning the muscle, bone, cartilage, and/or ligaments, especially if there is not just pain, but also tenderness to touch or shoulder movement/rotation.  Such might or might not be related to infection.  More likely, however is the possibility of nerve root compression, as can be seen with a bulging disc in the bony spine or stretching of a bundle of nerves in the axilla, commonly called the arm pit, called the brachial plexus.  This latter could well be related to the way you sleep.  Your first move should be to alter that sleeping position, to a more conventional position, unlikely to stretch the peripheral nerves.

[yariss]

I also have asthma, though more induced by seasonal allergies, which have been really high this year in 2008.