Nikki Bella, WWE star, just shared some updates on her fiancé Artem Chigvintsev’s health. Nearly one month has elapsed since Chigvintsev had to exit the “Dancing With the Stars: Live!” tour because of pneumonia.
“He still has pneumonia. Monday or Tuesday we’ll get [another] update,” Bella told Entertainment Tonight from the red carpet at the Fanatics Super Bowl party on Saturday. “He gets his lungs rescanned and we’ll find out if they’re better. The swelling’s gone down so, fingers crossed. We’re praying really hard that we get good news.”
Pneumonia is an infection in which the air sacs in one or both lungs become inflamed and fill with fluid or pus, causing fever, chills, fatigue, coughing, and breathing difficulties. On January 20, Chigvintsev announced on Instagram that he had been forced to drop out of the tour, which kicked off on January 7 in Virginia. “My goal is to recover as quickly as possible so I can rejoin my cast and crew on this incredible tour,” the 39-year-old dancer said in the post. On February 3, the Russian American shared an Instagram Stories post in which he said that further X-rays confirmed he was still facing pneumonia, but that he hoped his second course of antibiotics would “do the magic.”
Not only has the lung infection affected his tour, but it’s also impacted his wedding plans. Bella said at the Fanatics Super Bowl party that while she was excited to get married in Paris in the coming months, Chigvintsev’s health needed to come first. Either way, when the big day does finally arrive, it’s sure to be a lively one. “I always go big,” Bella said of her upcoming nuptials. The couple, who first met on the 25th season of Dancing With the Stars in 2017, have an 18-month-old son, Matteo, together.
While Chigvintsev had COVID-19 a few months ago, it’s not clear whether his pneumonia stemmed from the virus. In many other cases, pneumonia has been found to be a common complication of COVID-19. According to the Mayo Clinic, because the virus mainly attacks the lungs, it can lead to a range of mild to severe respiratory problems, including pneumonia. And Bella did, in fact, note that she’d realized something continued to be wrong with Chigvintsev’s health after he had COVID. “I could just tell there was something wrong, and something more [serious], so I was like, ‘He needs to see a doctor!’” she said. “I was the one who was like, ‘We need to get him to a doctor.’ So it’s been scary for a while.”
As Chigvintsev has been facing pneumonia for quite some time, you might be wondering, how long do pneumonia symptoms last? According to the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, it can vary widely. For some individuals, it’s possible to feel recovered after a week or two. For others, it can take longer than a month. However, overall, many people recovering from pneumonia continue to feel fatigued for about a month or so. How early they start a course of antibiotics is a factor. If you’re dealing with pneumonia, it’s always important to finish the full course of antibiotics, even if you begin to feel better. If you’re not experiencing significant improvement according to the timeline provided by your health care provider, the best course of action is to immediately contact a doctor. During recovery, it’s important to increase fluid intake, refrain from smoking, and take plenty of time to rest and to sleep if possible.
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