Discussion Coughing blood

So yeah, currently binging on my stack of chapters for trash of the county's family. And there are lots of scenes where characters coughs blood, literally. Various reasons too: overexerting oneself, getting hit hard, using too much power, backlash from an ability.

But does this really happen in real life for the said reason? Would using too much... I dunno... Energy (?) make you cough blood? The only reason I could think of for it to be possible is having your lungs bleed... but won't you drown if you got blood on your lungs?

... Too much rambling lol.

TLDR
Does coughing blood really happen? And for what reason? Also, do you think it's ridiculous how it's such a trope in novels?

 

well, TBC people cough blood though

 

Certain diseases can cause people to cough blood. Not just tuberculosis but pneumonia and bronchitis can have you coughing blood. Even having a hacking cough from a cold or a bloody nose can have you cough blood

 

Yeah, but it's a lung disease where a bacteria attacks your lungs and could damage blood pathways, right? (totally from memory)

 

As far as I know.

No amount of psychological strain can make you literally cough blood.

Whereas it can injure your brain, effect nervous system, make you faint.


Physically, an internal injury anywhere near the solar plexus could make you spit blood, and even when your stomach is injured pretty badly, the blood might reverse from the food pipe.

 

Is it possible to cough blood for no reason other than exertion? Like in the novels

 

now that we have taken this out of the way and know that really happens.
so yes, is possible to do so, if we look that we are talking about superhuman bodies and one of the features of a superhuman body is faster recovery and recuperation we can see they coughing up blood as they have received a serious trauma but since the super human body recovers faster than a normal one they are able to keep normal function and go back to kick ass or be kicked in short breaths later.
edit : i forget to add that where is possible to cough blood , the amount we are normally seeing or reading about is fake,unless you have a trauma big enough to cause your death anyway so coughing blood would not be the main concern at this point.

 

Isn't it usually from 'internal injuries'? Meaning their internal organs got damaged due shockwaves or some kind of qi stuff.

The trope probably began from characters actually having their lungs or windpipes damaged and coughing up blood, and then eventually 'internal injuries' all got lumped together as a concept instead of specific organs being damaged.

 

Uhm, in TBC, he coughs out blood not due to the "strain" but due to the ancient powers taking a toll on his body, then the vitality of the heart gets rid of the dead blood cells.

Effectively, he ends up with high blood pressure that leads to coughing out blood which is possible.

 

I know. But isn't that almost the same thing? Using the ancient powers makes him overexert his body's capabilities. Just like how it makes him hungry because you consume his body's energy and stuff.

 

There are some diseases that have that symptom, not all from the respiratory system
https://www.mayoclinic.org/symptoms/coughing-up-blood/basics/causes/sym-20050934

 

I would guess it is very unlikely unless your lungs or throat were over exerted. Throat more than lungs, like how a voice gets gravelly from over use if you continue speaking of screaming you could actually cause damage that would bleed and would also most likely make you cough.

 

You could burst a blood vessel in your throat from straining. Examples are coughing, living heavy objects and constipation. (Rare) Also if you have severe gastritis it could cause coughing up blood. Then most common reasons should be lung or rib injuries.

 

Well i know it from nose bleeding. You can cough blood . I did it myself till the doc "burn" the vien inside my nose with acid.

 

Close-to-none knowledge about anatomy here but...

Lungs absorb oxygen into the blood, so I assumed blood vessels "walls" in lungs were kinda thin, therefore prone to damage, therefore... as long as we accept "blood from the nose because of arousal", we're good to accept coughing blood due to other extortions.

But IRL... if someone is coughing blood, I'm frking taking him to ER.

~Edit: Ofc, I didn't mean to state that "blood from the nose because of arousal" is realistic. I meant to state that I accept this as a widely popularised exaggeration.

 

Same.

 

Lungs weren't bleeding. My throat just seemed a bit damaged. Coughed up blood twice.

 

Yes, coughing blood is possible. The reasons are numerous. I don't think it's a ridiculous trope in novels. I can't think of a ridiculous trope right now.

 

There are a lot of good responses here.

I generally agree that it is more likely to be medium/large airway, large vessel, to upper GI tract. I wouldn't underestimate the amount of bleeding can rapidly occur in the throat (e.g. some oral cancers), as quite a large volume of blood can be produced from even a small lesion. Ruptured esophageal varices can result in the production of massive bleeding too.

In contrast, it is a bit more difficult for blood to travel all the way from the alveoli of the lungs. Up to a third of a patients with diffuse alveolar hemorrhage (very bad bleeding in the air sacs, due to blood leaking out of the lung capillaries basically what @L0pez and others described with "high blood pressure") will not present with hemoptysis (coughing up blood), which to me means that you do actually need damage to a larger blood vessel or overwhelming amount of blood in the lung to get bleeding on a large scale.

Realistically you're unlikely to be at risk for this unless you have a pre-existing health condition.

The "burst blood vessel" is are lower esophageal varices, which results from chronic portal hypersion (high blood pressure in the liver) causing your blood circulation to take a detour through an abnormal route through the esophagus. The most common cause of portal hypertension is liver cirrhosis, which can be caused by many things including heavy alcohol use or hepatitis C.

Here's a picture!



The esophageal varices can get enormous!

Patients with esophageal varices are often counseled to avoid strenuous exercise as these vessels burst very easily.

This aside, any kind of blunt trauma to the chest can result in bleeding that comes up from the mouth.

As for a totally healthy person without any kind of trauma.... the most obscure case I can think of is a pneumothorax resulting in hemoptysis. Tall lanky perfectly healthy individuals can occasionally experience pneumothorax (sudden collapse of the lung -- kind of like a balloon popping) after physical activity. Hemoptysis rarely occurs in this setting.

 

Yeah but it's possible. That's what they were asking right? Coughing up blood can happen for multiple reasons.