At My Wits End

My opinion I think those infectious disease Dr's are a bunch of quacks. They are certainly a breed of their own. Even to this date they said my infection got in thru one of the valves in my heart and even my surgeon Dr. Malkowicz doesn't necessary agree with this because as he told me it could of got in anywhere this is what the infectious disease Dr's are going with, you tell me. Cheers, Joe

You are right Max which is why I phoned 911 the last time. The 9 hours was entirely spent in the little room he was assigned to. Trauma comes first at a level 1 Trauma center and we had to wait for the CT scan as there was a major automobile accident with people being flown in by helicopter. Life in a big city. Besides I'm tired of hospitals I was in 3 times last year myself in addition to Dick's 3 admissions and 3 ER visits where he was allowed to go home.

Julie,
So sorry to hear about your situation...
Just a tip for the next time you may have to go to
the hospital..Call EMS and have them take you..
This way you will avoid all the waiting time in the ER.
My experience has been, when you come in that way they
care for the patient right away.
Good luck to your husband..Hope start looking up soon..
Max

Lisa, It is interesting that a neurologist researched how to treat your Mother. My husbands urologist called in an infectious disease specialist. He started Dick on Isoniazid, Rifampin, Ethambutol, and Pyridoxine which is B-6. He is still taking these medications. The vancomycin was stopped a week ago and the Cipro last Monday. So his treatment is consistent with the article which is good to know. Thanks for locating it.
He has now had 4 days without a fever. He had to have 2 units of blood Tuesday due to low hemoglobin. Today he complains of fatigue and has not been able to do much more than get up.

Friday the Urologist started the drain withdrawal process. It is more painful than we realized it would be and he has to go back Wednesday and next Friday. The good news is the urine specimen was clean.

Julie,

My mother, age 76, had a similar experience about a year ago. Her doctors were lost as to how to treat her, but fortunately a university neurologist had moved to town about 4 weeks earlier. The neurologist worked with her former university colleagues to determine an appropriate treatment. She was given isoniazid, vancomycin and rifampin. Only after she recovered did I find the following article. Look at the question/answer in the right-hand column of page three. I hope your husband is doing better by now, but if he's not then please check out the article.

www.projectsinknowledge.com/Init/O/1589/1589-3.pdf

Lisa

Julie also found this.......www.chemocare.com/bio/bcg.asp
And the medline article is www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/sites/entrez?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12522745&dopt=Abst
Pat