Transcript for Whoopi Goldberg’s close call with pneumonia
?????? Whoopi Goldberg is sharing her story about the illness that almost killed her. “The view” host revealing her brush with death as she dealt with serious complications from pneumonia. I had pneumonia and I was septic. Pneumonia in both lungs which meant there was fluid, there was all kinds of stuff going on and, yes, I came very, very close to leaving the Earth. Good news, I didn’t. While joining us to discuss the potential dangers of pneumonia and what you need to know about is our chief medical correspondent Dr. Jen Ashton. Thank you so much for being with us. Good morning. What exactly is pneumonia? You heard whoopi talk about it. It is an infection that can be caused by bacteria, viruses or fungus in the lung. It involves the air sacs and then they fill with fluid or pus. If you take a look at this C.A.T. Scan, Eva, you can see how bad this can be. On a C.A.T. Scan of the lungs air looks black. Fluid or pus looks white so you can see on the right the technical term is dirty lungs but that’s a patient with pneumonia and all of that white can be pus and consolidated infection and that obviously can impair the ability of the blood to pick up oxygen. Which makes it understand why it’s so hard to breathe there. Whoopi said she was septic. What does that mean? Accord to sepsis.org 40% of Americans have never heard the term, and so she is increasing awareness by telling her story. This is when a localized infection spreads to the bloodstream and if not treated it can progress to involve the kidneys and heart and lead to shock and if not treated absolutely it can be fatal. Warning signs for sepsis, things we should look for. In the hospital we use different criteria. But for people outside, if they’re dealing with just a run-of-the-mill infection we use the acronym sepsis. If you take a look at it, S for shivering, extreme discomfort in a certain part of your body, pale or discolored skin that can be around the mouth or nail beds. A person could be sleepy or confused, disoriented and feel like they want to die. Shortness of breath. This is an emergency. You need to get medical attention because the key with sepsis is prompt and aggressive treatment and that can make all the difference. All right, thank you, Dr. Jen Ashton. Always a pleasure to have you.
This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate.