Word: lungfuls
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Speaking for a group of distinguished pathologists and statisticians,* Dr. Hammond outlined the preliminary results of a painstaking study begun seven years ago. At the East Orange, N.J.. Veterans Administration Hospital, lung tissue was obtained from 227 postmortems, put on microscope slides, and carefully examined by pathologists. The hundreds of slides were identified only with coded numbers, and pathologists did not know their origin. Later statisticians were able to match the pathological findings with the histories of the dead patients. The results of the study added up to an elaborate description of progressive smoke damage...
Subjected to Stress. Deeply inhaled smoke, the researchers found, irritates the cells that line the tiniest chambers of the lung (alveoli). The walls of the alveoli thicken, lose their elasticity and much of their ability to do their vital job of exchanging carbon dioxide for oxygen. Subjected to sudden stress-such as a cough or sneeze-the alveolar walls rupture; part of the lung becomes useless...
Even while it is attacking the alveoli, dense smoke also damages the small arteries that carry blood to the lung surface for oxygenation. The artery walls become fibrous and thickened. Soon, internal deposits on the thickened walls make the arteries so narrow that little blood can get through. Eventually many tiny arteries are blocked completely...
Damaging Chain. These two sets of events alone would be enough to explain why thousands of Americans are "lung cripples," suffering from what most U.S. doctors call pulmonary fibrosis and chronic emphysema. But the damaging chain of events runs...
...destruction of smaller blood vessels in the lung and the thickening of slightly larger ones increases the blood pressure in the pulmonary arteries and puts a strain on the right side of the heart...