I had trouble swallowing and felt like I was choking or somebody was strangling me at times pre-op. This got better after surgery. Pre-surgery, rib mobilization done by a PT helped with this particular symptom. It was a scary symptom, I'm sure some people thought I was crazy when I described this... I have asthma, so it was also aggravated when allergens were present so I didn't know what was causing it...really both I think.