With the regular flu season starting, how can experts tell if someone has the regular flu or swine flu? You cannot see a virus…unless they throw every throat culture (if they did one) under an electron microscope which is simply not economical. - Jinx
I was having similar questions after watching network news last night. They are starting to distribute H1N1 vaccine. The newscaster mentioned how inportant this is, because at one clininc (?) in Atlanta (?) (I did not pay much attention to details) there were something like five thousand kids brought in with “flu-like” symptoms recently.
My first thought was that “flu-like symptoms” does not equal flu. My second thought was how they could tell, even if it was a flu, that it was swine flu and not “ordinary” flu. My third thought was that I wished they gave us a baseline for comparison, say by tellng us how many kids were brought in for the same symptoms in the same time period last year.
But I guess half-informed is as good as I can expect from television network news.
A simple ELISA test should be able to discriminate between the two. H and N refer to proteins on the surface of the virus particle that provoke distinct antibody responses. I don’t know under what situations they’d bother to find out, though.
Definitive swine flu diagnoses require lab testing of throat cultures by the CDC.
Sending flu samples off for testing to see if they’re H1N1 also allows tracking of “seasonal flu”. As a practical matter, though, most people who get flu won’t ever get tested, and in fact quite a few won’t even see a doctor. Not necessarily a problem if the sick people STAY HOME and the illness never becomes very serious.
I may have had the swine flu already - I had “flu like” symptoms my sister the doctor said were consistent with what she’s seeing, but of course I wasn’t tested, never went to the doctor, and thus will never know, really.
The policy at our hospital is to test every 5th person coming in the door with influenza-like illness (ILI). This is either a PCR test (testing for the presence of specific virus or multiple viruses DNA) or a direct fluorescent antigen (DFA) test, or both (DFA is faster, but less sensitive I believe). The only real reason to test for the virus is for epidemiological data. We shove a swab way up a dude’s nose to collect the sample. We actually test for a whole panel which includes influenza (regular or H1N1), coronaviruses, enterovirus, rhinovirus, human metapneumovirus…and I think that’s it.
For us lowly medical students the criteria for self-diagnosis (ie: should we stay home if we have the symptoms of swine flu) and also the one they were informally using at the hospitals/clinics where we work- this season:
If they cough and they’ve got a fever- they’ve got swine flu (H1N1). No one told us anything more than that and just to document it for our own records as H1N1, because we don’t have the means to test for it any more extensively, and to treat both variants as if it was the swine flu version.
I think they said they were doing this because it pretty much looks like the H1N1 was going to be the major flu of choice this season with the common usual strains being minimal and less than 5-10% were the numbers thrown about at the meetings.
So yeah- that’s not very helpful- but if you cough and have a fever AKA have flu like symptoms- we’re told you’ve got swine flu.
I know someone who works at a local hospital. They’re seeing TONS of flu cases this year.
They quit testing for H1N1, though, because “flu” vs. “swine flu” doesn’t change the treatment, so they don’t really care. I don’t know if they’re sampling for epidemiology reporting like Nunavut Boy.
My workplace just released flu protocol. If you have a fever > 100 and sore throat or cough - GO HOME!!! Don’t come back until you’ve been 24 hours without fever without anti-fever meds.
If supervisors find out that an employee meets guidelines, they’re supposed to send the employee home. (Although supervisors are not allowed to check temps or anything like that, it’s just based on self-reporting.)
Yes!! It’s about time.
So basically, even if you are tested for H1N1, you may not know if you have it or not until you are getting better.
I just want to say that “Flu or Swine Flu” is a horrible idea for a game show.
Mainly it’s the odds. Almost all influenza right now is H1N1. As that changes telling the two apart may be important only because H1N1 is not Tamilflu resistant and most other influenza currently is - a high risker with H1N1 should be put on Tamiflu but not one with most seasonal flu. Of course for someone not high risk it matters not a whit. TLC and look out for things like fever coming back or lastin too long and other signs of pneumonia or other complications …
Same here. I had flu-like symptoms that I emailed to my doctor, who said “yep, sounds like flu. Don’t come see me, I’m not going to test you, stay home, rest, push fluids, call me if [list of things that would indicate badness].”
Do doctors generally believe you if you tell them your normal body temp is somewhere between 96.6-97.1? I could be registering 98.6 and be running a fever.
I did mention it my doc last year, not when I was feverish, just to see if she could explain why my normal isn’t the same as everyone else’s. Her response is that everyone is different and it’s no big deal.
StG
I just saw Ruffian’s OP about the same topic as my post. I’m glad I’m not th eonly one who has a screwy body temperature.
StG
My GP is no longer testing for swine flu/H1N1–they’re just assuming everything is swine flu. When I started coming down with symptoms on Sunday, I called my GP Monday and was immediately started on Tamiflu (I’m pregnant, so high risk).
I emailed my OB’s nurse, and she just called to check on me. She went over the treatment plan and said to keep them apprised. I feel crappy today, but hopefully not so crappy tomorrow. We shall see.