A 50 year old fool Gives Thanks for antibiotics

So on T-Day afternoon we're at Al's brothers house for round two. They live in NJ so we don't get there that often. Anyways, I don't ever remember seeing the trampoline in the back yard but they tell me it's always been there. So more than a little fortified with holiday cheer I climb up on the trampoline and started testing the springs for failure potential. (For those of you who've met me, you know what I mean. For those who haven't, lets just say my fat ass jumping up and down probably exceeded the "designed capacity." So I have a lot of fun, made everyone laugh, managed to do a flip, and didn't break anything.

As expected I woke up on Friday morning more than a little sore. No big deal, I used to feel the exact same way after playing a game of hockey in goal. (Although the trampoline has a bit more bounce than ice you get to wear a lot of pads.) The weird thing is my left elbow is the size of a baseball. Didn't hurt, not a bit of pain, just a big lump sticking out. You have these fluid filled sacs in your joints called bursa and I must have landed on mine just right (wrong) and it started to swell up big time. OK, NBD, the swelling will go away. It's not like I broke anything, right? I don't have a mark on me, absolutely no breaks in the skin for buggies to get in.

So by that night I'm nauseous, my arm is throbbing and I've got a fever. We got home to her Mom's after out day out and I go to bed by 7pm. Saturday morning we drive home and my arm is really bugging me. I can't straighten it out and I can't bend it. It's THROBBING and I'm burning up. As we get closer to home I call the hospital where I work to see who's the doc on in the ED that night. Well, the two who are on I wouldn't let take care of my dog, so I suck it up and go to bed. I wake up around around 7pm and call again. Luck was with me and the best guy in the dept was on, so I drive down there.

I've got a fever of 103, my arm is red and swollen from my shoulder to midway down my forearm, and I'm just sicker than sheet. I didn't even care that my collegues in the ED, where I worked for the past 10 years, are having great fun at my expense. At least they were until I took my shirt off and they got a look at my arm. My CBC showed a white count of 17 thousand! (Normal is 5-10)

My friend Steve tapped the elbow and took out 20 cc of puss. Nasty looking stuff like that ain't supposed to come out of you! So they start me on three different antibiotics, to cover staff, MRSA and all the anerobic nasties that are rolling around out there. They wanted to admit me but I opted to go home to the bugs that I know and love, no-one who is sick should be in a hospital, there are WAY too many nasties growing there. Besides my wife is a nurse practitioner, she'll keep me alive, right?

Today my fever is down under 100 and I don't feel like my eyes are going to pop out of my head. My arm is a little less swollen and the redness might be receeding. Of course all those antibiotics are making my crap my brains out, but at least I still have an arm and can still wipe my own arse. I went to see my PCP today and he told me to go buy a lottery ticket on my way home, I'm pretty damned lucky and might want to ride the streak.

Weird sheet, Mon.

So thank you to all the drug companies out there. You charge way too much for your stuff but this week, for me, it's worth it.

PTN

abcessed joint or just an abcess at the joint?


kind of an odd way to get the infection. From what you mentioned, you work in the ED. I would imagine that your skin is colonized with all sorts of nasty bugs. Probably broke the skin slightly and let them in.


BTW, I am completely paranoid about bringing home Germs from work. I leave my shoes outside, was my scrubs seperately (laundry not provided).

sounds pretty nasty. glad to hear it is on the tail end. not to sound insensitive or anything but, any pics???

jct9335 said:

sounds pretty nasty. glad to hear it is on the tail end. not to sound insensitive or anything but, any pics???

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No, man it wasn't on his TAIL, it was on his ELBOW!!!!


BTW, no, pics are NOT necessary...................

We're still not sure if it is 'in' or just 'around' the joint. Cultures are still in micro should be back by now but weren't when I called. I'm seriously hoping for around.

I agree about being a bit paranoid about bugs. I've been down in the ED so long I figured I was immune to anything and everything. Then, three months ago I got RIF'ed and bumped out of my job and ended upstairs in the ICU. (I work in an elephant graveyard, nurses go there to die. I worked almost 11 years full time nights in the ED and I was the junior person.) So after the first week in the unit I started undressing just inside the door, bagging my scrubs and running upstairs to the shower. Those pt's up there got some way nasty sheet growing in them.

And Bernies right, no-one wants to see this nasty thing on this forum. JAMA maybe, HBT hell no!

PTN

I left out the worse part. For anerobic coverage my PCP started me on Flagyl. For those of you non-medical folks out there, the absolute LAST thing you want to do while taking Flagyl is drink alcohol, unless you like puking your guts out for hours and hours. And I haven't bottled my Sam entries yet!


Damn!

Damn. Sorry about that, sounds like it completely sucks. These antibiotic resistant bugs like MSRA are pretty fricken scary.

You are so lucky...I love trampolines.

Wish I'd have been there...

...best wishes for a speedy recover...

Good luck Jumpy Jumpmier...

Dewd, that sux.

This 40 year old is on Amoxicillin for a couple weeks because not one, but both my toddlers tested positive for Strep this last week. Yeah, the wife too (I wonder.....). I tested negative on the culture last Saturday. Either the kids or the ol' lady brought it home, but I'm a bit upset one way or the other.

Glad to hear you're doing better!

I thought of you tonight, as I was wrestling a nearly dead homeless guy.

I was covered from my chest down to my knees in slimey dead skin cells and campfire smoke smell.

I know I cultured a few billion new bacteria on me. I ended up taking a shower at work and going home in a pair of pajama bottoms and a 3x scrub top that I scrounged out of the clean linens.

Insulin, beer (cheap beer), and narcotics. Are a helluva way to try to kill yourself. Plus I think I strained my back, trying to pull the person out of the car they drove up in. I grabbed ahold of their shirt, but it pulled off, so I tried to do a Georgia lift and the person had a cast on one arm. Making it a pita to lift them. So I ended up reefing him out of the car by his arms, then throwing them into a wheelchair.

On the plus side, at least they were not naked and awake and wanting to wrestle. Those people always make for a ****ty night.

Hungry,
Nothing worse than wrestling some drunk smelly fool who, by the way, is a Constitutional scholar and will tell you in no uncertai terms how you are violating his rights.

Man I miss the ED. It's the most fun you can have with your clothes on.

BierMuncher said:

You are so lucky...I love trampolines.

Wish I'd have been there...

...best wishes for a speedy recover...

Good luck Jumpy Jumpmier...

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You're an odd duck there, BM. An odd duck.

Sounds like me last summer. Was up on cape cod visiting my aunt and uncle. I didn't have any wounds or breaks in the skin, but my elbow started to swell up. Over the course of a couple days it got bigger and bigger, and started to really hurt, and was hot to the touch...and I started feeling bad. So I went to the E.R. and they got me in there really quick, gave me AB's, said it was cellulitis infection. No idea how, but yeah, that sucked. And since stupid insurance doesn't cover the E.R., I'm still paying that crap down today.

paulthenurse said:

Hungry,
Nothing worse than wrestling some drunk smelly fool who, by the way, is a Constitutional scholar and will tell you in no uncertai terms how you are violating his rights.

Man I miss the ED. It's the most fun you can have with your clothes on.

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this week, I have been told 6 times that I will be hearing from someones lawyer. I have to bite my tongue from asking them how they afford a lawyer and not deodorant.


Its been an odd week where I work. The cold weather must be bringing in the odd ones.

I am just getting over my second MRSA infection in the last 3 months... I did my best to not drink while on the antibiotic this time, so hopefully it will go away for good this time. GDB the bald spots on my head now though.

Last time some dirtbag said that to me I told him that I'd take his lawyer out to lunch and we could laugh about how the ****heads he had for clients were the same ****heads I had for patients, how come he made so much more than I did?

Probably just as well I got out of the ED when I did, I was becoming a mite cynical.
PTN

Get well soon Paul.

Thanks John.

I am on the mend. Today I was able to use my arm well enough to haul out and stack all of the 16" leanths of logs from two of the four trees I cut down last week, even if I did do most of the work using only my right arm. If its feeling really goods tomorrow I'll cut up the other two trees and see about breaking out the axe. (Don't go there.) I'm really hoping to open up the backyard to more sunlight so I can plant more back there. And I want to build a garage/brewery up front at the end of the driveway, but there are WAY too many trees in the way. Slowly but surely.

BTW, I was at Doughery's on Saturday afternoon with my daughter for dinner, sort of thought I might run into the two of you.
P

If you're out that way this week give me a call. Always good to see PTN. Glad you're feeling better. Thanks again for that bbc I can't say how much you changed my opinion about them. I'm looking forward to seeing you and Alice again.

Evan! said:

Sounds like me last summer. Was up on cape cod visiting my aunt and uncle. I didn't have any wounds or breaks in the skin, but my elbow started to swell up. Over the course of a couple days it got bigger and bigger, and started to really hurt, and was hot to the touch...and I started feeling bad. So I went to the E.R. and they got me in there really quick, gave me AB's, said it was cellulitis infection. No idea how, but yeah, that sucked. And since stupid insurance doesn't cover the E.R., I'm still paying that crap down today.

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If you happen to get out that way again please let some New England folks know. I'd be willing to take a hour drive to buy you a beer.

Hey I still have a Gott cooler/mash tun for you. I'm working at Memorial one or two days next week, I'll give you a call and we can meet up.
P

bigjohnmilford said:

If you happen to get out that way again please let some New England folks know. I'd be willing to take a hour drive to buy you a beer.

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Ya, what he said. I lived in Falmouth for 20 years in a former life. I know a few places down there that serve a good pint.
PTN