Adventures in MRSA
Let me start off by saying that I once again have cheated death. While I'm not quite sure why that is, I have a long history of doing so and for that I am thankful. A couple of weeks ago I got a zit on the inside edge of my nose. While I am aware of just how glamorous that is, it was the beginning of an unpleasant journey. The second day in, this stupid thing was red and the third day my upper lip was a little swollen. Yay, that was fun. Saturday morning, which was day four, the entire right side of my face was swollen and I was in serious pain. I went to the ER and saw a doc at about 7:00 am. He diagnosed me with an infection which was most likely MRSA and sent me on my way with a prescription of bactrim and some topical bactroban. Ok, so at this point I was thinking that things would take care of themselves if I was a good monkey and took my medicine. Boy, was I wrong. The next day, my face was swollen even worse than the previous day and I had to call in sick to work which I have never done at this job. That's when my coworkers knew it was serious. Monday morning I called my doctor's office and made an appointment that day with the PA Peggy Bainbridge. Wonderful woman...When I came in to see her, told her what I was taking and that things had gotten worse, she told me to hold on, she had to go make a phone call. I decided that that couldn't be good and sat quietly. When she came back, Peggy told me that she had had to decide whether to admit me or have me go on an outpatient basis to the hospital for IV antibiotics. Lucky for me, she chose the latter. My instructions were to take my happy butt to the hospital immediately for my first IV infusion of vancomycin. I did just that. The first infusion was a regular IV, but for infusion number two and thereafter I was to have a picc line placed for easier access as I was to go twice a day for ten days. That first run was when I found out that I am allergic to vancomycin. There's this thing called red man syndrome which only normally happens if you get vanco infused in less time than an hour. Due to my dumb luck, and some really out there allergies i get red man syndrome anyway and my whole damn head itches. After that, I had to take benedryl just to get my antibiotics. Nothing like sleeping half of your life away. Watching the picc line get put in was the most fun I had through this whole ordeal, it's a really nifty process if you have the stomach to watch such things. So every day I went to the hospital at 9:00 am and 9:00 pm. At the end of the second day, they took my blood to test my antibiotic levels (forgot to mention that I still had to take the bactrim this whole time). The morning of the third day, they told me my vanco levels were too low and they had to do the blood draw again. No problem. That one came back too low too. It seems that I happen to have kidneys of steel and they were filtering out all of this medicine I was getting. That afternoon one of the doctors from my regular office called and told me they were taking me off of the vanco since it wasn't working and I was getting a new oral antibiotic called rifampin. Before this all began, I already knew that I was allergic to doxycyclene, zithromax and cipro. I had added vancomycin to that list too. But, I react to rifampin too. It makes my head want to explode and that's the first headache that I've had in 25 years. So, I was taking the benadryl, bactrim, rifampin and vicodin. That is more druggage than I have had in ten years ingested in one day. My follow up appointment with Peggy brought new fun too. I told her that I had a hard spot on my cheek, just below my sinus cavity. That made her disappear too. She came back and told me that I was to go see Dr. Brown, an ENT specialist and no, I shouldn't stop and get lunch first. I did what I was told and ended up not eating lunch at all. That hard spot was an abcess which had to be drained so the good savage doctor shot me up with local anesthetic. What he didn't tell me is that local has little to no effect on infected pus filled areas. I wish he had warned me. He then proceeded to cut into the inside of my cheek and scrape an ounce of nasty out which was then followed by the insertion of a drain tube and stitches. I found out something interesting that day. I can yell goddammit with my mouth held open and tons of sharp things in there and it actually sounds like goddammit. I traumatized some little children in the waiting room I'm sure. They finally cultured that day and to no one's surprise it was indeed MRSA. I went back three days later to have the drain tube removed but I had already removed it that morning when it had fallen out of it's hole and was dangling by it's thread in my mouth. The thought of accidentally biting down on that thing and tearing out the stitches was strangely unappealing. Go figure. But, things were finally looking good. The following Tuesday I saw the doctor one last time and he cleared me to return to work. I had missed 7 days worth and hadn't set foot in the building for ten days. I lost about 7 pounds through all of this which isn't too bad, but I'm already pretty thin so it wasn't really good for me either. I'm still taking bactrim and while I'm not allergic to it, it's these huge horse pills which I can't swallow so I end up chewing them and they taste terrible. My director of nursing told me that my MRSA was the fastest spread she has ever seen and that I'm lucky I didn't die. I already knew that but I know what she means. I feel better, look better and am back to work 6 days a week. Almost everything's back to normal.