Friday, August 28, 2009

MRSA again!

Almost exactly a year ago, Jay came home from school with an incredibly high fever, body aches, chills, vomiting, etc. We thought it was just a bad case of the flu. By the next morning, his leg was swollen and bright fire engine red. I insisted that he go into the doc as quickly as possible, and although he was reluctant he went in. The PA told him he had cellulitus, gave him a shot in the bum, and sent him home. By the next evening his entire leg was red with angry streaks going up his thigh. Jay didn't think it warranted a trip to the ER but I prevailed and off we went.


The ER doc took one look at his leg and immediately admitted him. We had no idea how severe it was until the doc enlightened us on the dangers of staph infections. It was MRSA! You know, that dangerous flesh eating bacteria that is super resistant to antibiotics? After a week long hospital stay and 3 more weeks recouping at home, Jay finally kicked it.

Here we are, a year later, and he's on his third round of MRSA. Started out with a little bump on his calf and now it's just nasty. He immediately got on an antibiotic, but it didn't seem to make much progress. He went back in today, was given a second antibiotic and told that if it doesn't clear up he'll have to go in to the hospital to have a pic line put in so that the drugs can be administered directly into his blood stream. He's one sick guy! Hopefully this second round of drugs will do the trick, but obviously this is something we will forever be fighting. It's frightening and I just pray none of the kids come down with it. Heaven helps us if it spreads to the rest of the family!

2 comments:

Mel said...

Oh my gosh! That stuff is NASTY!!!
My brother got it in his elbow and he's been about a year trying to get rid of it. Poor Jay! Hope the
meds work.

Todd Shauna and gang said...

aaaaa that is awful! Good thing you have young kids to help you with everything We'll be thinking of you and remembering you in our prayers!