Fabienne Carat entered emergency care after a severe pneumothorax left her with a fully detached lung.
The 48-year-old actress, known for television roles in Plus belle la vie and Section de recherches, sought medical help after severe breathing difficulties and pain between her ribs and in her back. La Dernière Heure reported that the condition can prove fatal. She visited the emergency department unexpectedly before sharing video updates from her hospital bed.
“In the first video, I was smiling because I didn’t know what I had. And actually, I have a pneumothorax with my lung completely detached. There you go, and so it’s very small because the air took up a lot of space. That’s why I couldn’t breathe anymore and I had intercostal pain and especially in my back too”, said Fabienne Carat.
Medical staff connected her to monitoring equipment, established an intravenous line, and performed a drainage procedure to remove trapped air from her chest cavity.
“So, they’re taking my blood pressure, the catheter, and they’ve just put a drain in me. It went very, very well and they even hooked up a suction machine because it was well positioned”, Carat told followers. “On a mis l’aspirateur”, she added, according to Télé-Loisirs.
Control X-rays confirmed that the suction device cleared accumulated air and reattached the lung. “It sucked out the air well, that’s positive”, Carat said, as reported by La Dernière Heure. Medical personnel instructed her to remain under observation in intensive care for several days, an extension that surprised the mother of one.
“I can’t leave right away. It was a surprise. You always think everything is fine and when they tell you, ‘You’re going to have to stay two or three days in the hospital in intensive care,’ it feels a bit weird”, she said regarding her hospital stay, adding that she still needs to wear a drain for a couple of days.
“I went to the emergency room by chance because I couldn’t breathe and I had the feeling I wasn’t going to wake up”, Carat told Télé-Loisirs.
Carat used her platform to urge people to take respiratory warning signs seriously instead of pushing past discomfort. “If you have trouble breathing, don’t hesitate to get an X-ray”, she said, as relayed by Télé-Loisirs.