A 32-year-old man training intensely for a triathlon developed a hoarse voice that would not go away. An inhaled steroid from his doctor did nothing. When a throat specialist finally examined his vocal cords, the left one was not moving.
The cause was not in his throat at all. Cardiologists at Poznań University of Medical Sciences in Poland found severe pulmonary hypertension, dangerously high blood pressure in the arteries of the lungs. It had stretched his main pulmonary artery enough to press on the nerve that controls the left vocal cord.
