Catching a "breath of fresh air" has new meaning for a North Texas woman.
For more than 20 years, 62-year-old Joyce Stovall of Mansfield stayed attached to an oxygen tank.
She was diagnosed in her 30s with asthma and emphysema and though she finally kicked her own long-term smoking habit, her lungs were so damaged that doctors suggested she be put on the waiting list for a lung transplant.
Because of other medical conditions, Stovall says she feared she wouldn’t recover from transplant surgery, so she opted for an FDA-approved, minimally invasive procedure performed at Texas Health Harris Methodist Hospital Fort Worth.
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Interventional pulmonologist Dr. Sai Karan Vamsi Guda implanted endobronchial valves into Stovall’s diseased upper right lobe.
The one-way valves, about the size of a pencil eraser, allow trapped air in an overinflated lobe to be exhaled, shrinking the lobe and preventing further air blockage.
"They have improvement in health status, improvement in lung function, their exercise capacity that goes up," said Dr. Guda about the results of the procedure. "These are patients that may not have been able to walk and now they're thinking of going dancing!"
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According to Texas Health, The procedure does not involve any cutting or incisions.
Rather, the valves are placed in the airways using a small camera called a bronchoscope, which is inserted into the lungs through the patient’s nose or mouth.
Normal lung function is greater than 70%.
Stovall’s lung function prior to having the valves implanted was at only about 19%.
Since the valve placements, it’s doubled to 39% and she's now able to breathe without the supplemental oxygen.
"I'm looking forward to getting out more in my yard again, raking leaves and getting to go dance with my husband again," said Stovall. "Just living life."
