What to do about a multivitamin that was/is in my windpipe?

What you should do is see a doctor, if you think you have a vitamin stuck in your windpipe. Whatever’s going on, if it is causing you to cough and exhale “violently” then you need to see a doctor.

See a doctor.

Unless you think it would be able to be dissolved with hot water. In which case you could swallow some (not too hot you don’t want your throat to swell).

If something that size was stuck in the windpipe you would know about it. You would have severe difficulty breathing and you would be calling 911 not looking on the internet.

An irritant that size in your windpipe would make you choke. You would have noticed it instantly, if you had ‘inhaled’ the vitamin instead of ‘swallowed’ it. Your bronchial tubes would go into spasm. They are sensitive. Nor would it ‘dissolve’ in your windpipe. Anyone who has had food or drink go down ‘the wrong way’ can attest to that feeling.

However, your oesophagus isn’t as sensitive, but it travels down your throat, side by side for a while. It sounds like you may have irritated your oesophagus, (the pipe your food goes down), considerably. You should go to a doctor and get it looked at if it hurts that bad. Try to relax. Holding your throat tight and making yourself cough can cause problems.

The awesome thing about your oesophagus is that you have involuntary muscles running all the way down it, squeezing it and forcing the food down to your stomach. When we swallow (and we swallow over 2000 times a day) we help set in action those muscles and they push down what ever we shove down there, be it food, drink or pills.

By not taking a drink with the pill, the muscles probably had a harder time getting the pill to your stomach, especially if you were a bit dehydrated.

I would gargle with some salt water and see if that helps. If the pain persists, especially when you are eating or drinking food, see a doctor.

Hope this helps.

My mother told be the other day to never dry-swallow tablets, because she read about some woman in the newspaper who discovered a tablet had been stuck in her throat and it had burned though the windpipe/esophagus or whatever it was. Another vote for the doctor. though it’s probably not in your windpipe. Hope not anyway!

Get thee to the emergency room ASAP. If it should shift, you’ll suffocate within a couple of minutes.

Yup. Doctor. If a pill is stuck in your windpipe it needs to be removed bronchoscopically. You’re not going to suffocate, but if it’s really stuck in there, it could get stuck in a bronchus and cause a post-obstructive pneumonia.

Is there a way to coax it out on my own if it really is stuck in there? Put yourself in my shoes. If there were something you could do, to avoid having to go to the doctor, you’d do it. Also, the coughs were intentional.

If it is actually stuck in your wind pipe then you need to see a doc. Now. There is nothing you can do to get it out on your own.

@Afos22 Standing on your head and coughing is the only thing that comes to mind, and you’ve already done that.

I just submerged one of the same multivitamins in warm water. It is disintegrating pretty rapidly. So maybe it has already disintegrated within my windpipe and it is just irritated. I’ll let you know how the rest of my experiment works out. It has been in the water for about 10–15 minutes so far and has lost at least 20 percent of its volume.

I’ll say this one more time and then I’ll leave you alone. If you seriously inhaled a pill, and you can’t get it out intact you need to see a physician.

If there was enough moisture in your windpipe to make the tablet start to dissolve it will turn in to a sludge first and block your bronchus and you will then suffocate. At this point even if you were to attend ER imediately there is probably little they coud do before you died.

After about 35–40 minutes, there is only about 20–25% of the original volume left. Keep in mind, I inhaled this thing about a week ago.

The fact that I haven’t choked on sludge and died means a few things:

A) The thing has already disintegrated and my body is working on cleaning it out.*
B) It is still fully intact 7 days later
C) It is still slowly disintegrating
D) My bronchi are wider than the volume of sludge or the vitamin didn’t wait until every last bit of it were sludge before sliding into my bronchi.
E) I am on the verge of death by sludge

I am certain that I will never ask for medical advice on fluther ever again. Your replies would send any less-stable person into a frantic race to the emergency room, possibly further injuring her/himself while in a panic, only to find out that they would have been fine and now they have to pay for all the procedures.

I mean, I could see your concern if you didn’t know that the vitamin would dissolve at a moist body temperature, but if you said that I may die after finding out that it dissolves…

“I am certain that I will never ask for medical advice on fluther ever again”

Good plan.

You missed out F) you never inhaled it in the first place and can’t tell the difference between a sore throat and something choking you.

@Lightlyseared I was trying to write something in that regard, but I didn´t want to be that blunt… but yeah.

or F) I didn’t inhale it

No, you did not inhale it.

Just an FYI: @Rarebear is a physician, and @Lightlyseared is an ER nurse, if I remember correctly. I would follow their advice.

@augustlan Not only am I a physician, but I’m a physician who does endoscopies and pulls crap out of people’s esophagus and trachea all the time.

Listen to that man ^^.

@Rarebear

Wow, that sounds like such a fun job ! I’m envious~~

:D

@Rarebear Wouldn’t he have started choking like crazy 6 days ago, when he initially inhaled the thing? If something gets past my epiglottis, I know it right away.

@Rarebear was very helpful =)

@cazzie Yes, he would have been coughing, but he’s the one who started out this thread by talking about how he inhaled a vitamin pill. The vitamin pill is either there or it’s not. If it is, and it hasn’t come out by now, he needs professional help. If it’s not there, then it’s a moot question.

He didn’t say he had a coughing fit when he took the pill. If he had a coughing fit when he took the pill, wouldn’t he have said?

@cazzie Sure. That’s why I think it’s unlikely that he actullly inhaled it. He’s the one who said he inhaled it so I was taking him at his word.

@Rarebear – Right. If he inhaled a pill, his airflow would have been restricted and he’d have been gasping for breath. He’d have gone to emergency on his own without needing to ask anyone first…

@HungryGuy No, actually. A pill isn’t big enough to restrict airflow.

@HungryGuy but enough to induce one hell of a coughing fit.

@Rarebear , yes… and that is why I answered the question the way I did, trying to explain what I suspected happen, rather than be short and rude with the poster.

@Rarebear although it could easily trigger laryngospasm

@Lightlyseared Oh, that’s true, of course. But it wouldn’t have been obstruction from the pill itself, that’s all I’m saying.

@Rarebear a comforting thought while your own body suffocates you. ;)

@lightlyseared I’ve actually had to deal with acute laryngospasm relatively recently. Scary as hell. We extubated this patient and she immediately went into laryngospasm. She desaturated and I couldn’t get her reintubated because the cords were shut. Fortunately she had a little airway, so we could bag her and keep her oxygenated and the anesthesiologist came up and was able to get a 6.0 tube in. She ended up doing fine after we gave her some steroids.

@Rarebear pulled a Volkswagen out of my throat once. Remember that? Long story. : )

lmfao