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Boxing star Teofimo Lopez is lucky to be alive, according to a doctor who examined him and reviewed his medical records following his fight against George Kambosos last week at Madison Square Garden.
Lopez lost WBA (Super), IBF, WBO, and The Ring lightweight titles in the bout which he fought with the extremely dangerous condition diagnosed as “pneumomediastinum.”
The 24-year-old Lopez was reportedly fighting with air surrounding his chest wall, heart, and neck.
“He’s lucky he’s not dead,” said Dr. Peter Constantino, executive director of the New York Head and Neck Institute, via ESPN.com. “I mean, really lucky.”
The cause of the air may have been from a small tear that was discovered in his esophagus.
“The air was surrounding his chest wall and his heart and his neck — places where air is not supposed to be,” said Dr. Linda Dahl, who worked as a ringside physician for the New York State Athletic Commission. “If he was hit in the neck or the chest — a certain way, in a certain place — he could have developed a pneumothorax [collapsed lung]. … He would have instantly been down and unable to breathe and needing a chest tube.
“He could have died, for sure,” said Dr. Linda Dahl, an otolaryngologist (ENT) with surgical privileges at three prestigious Manhattan hospitals. “How he breathed, I can’t even explain to you. It’s like somebody tied a 300-pound set of weights around his chest … like his neck and chest were in a vise. That’s how he fought.”
Lopez said that he simply believed he was fighting through asthma which he has dealt with before, but it turned out to be a much serious condition. The fight was previously scheduled to take place on June 19 but was later rescheduled after Lopez tested positive for COVID-19.
As for his next fight, Lopez says he believes he has outgrown the division and his next fight will be at 140-pounds.
