About two years ago, I woke up nauseous, severely light headed, disorientated. I was sweating bullets (it was summer) and I was barely able to walk. I managed to find my thermometer and took my temperature and it only registered about 96.5 deg F. To make a long story short, I got a friend to drive me to a Dr. (I was in no condition to drive), and she diagnosed me with vertigo. She gave me a shot in the ass. I was wobbly for about 4 days afterward and fortunately I have not had any relapse.
But my curiousity was piqued by the low body temperature. I know it is a symptom of hypothermia but that is usually a result of exposure.
Besides hypothermia, I have never heard of anyone having a low body temperature. Is there a common malady that has low body temperature?
What is your normal temperature? Not everybody has a normal temp of 98.6, and 96.5, especially when you first wake up, may be normal. The doctor diagnosed vertigo, but that’s not a diagnosis, but a symptom. What caused the vertigo? Many diseases can cause vertigo, incuding the flu, UTI, inner ear infection, etc. IANAMD.
You mentioned the symptoms of light-headedness, disorientation, profuse sweating, and weakness, but not vertigo, yet your doctor diagnosed vertigo. Vertigo is when the world spins around. It’s interesting that one shot relieved your symptoms. I wonder what you really did have.
When I am feel well, my body temperature is usually a little lower than 98.6 deg F. Maybe 98.4 F or 98.2 F. Frankly I have never took my temperature, after waking up, and feeling well.
Maybe I will tomorrow, if I think about it.
Actually I think she gave me two shots, and one was a sedative. I know I basically slept for 36 hours after the shots. She not give a prescrption although she recommended that I buy OTC mezzanine. That day is kind of blurry, I do know when I was waiting for my ride to the Doctor, I was dry heaving in the yard. I woke up early that morning, feeling bad and I think I took some tylenol.
My buddy (knowing I had taken the day off) called me about 8:30 am wanting to play golf later. He knew something was wrong right away. I told him I was going to take a shower and I was going to need a ride to the Doctor. I showered, got dressed, called and he drove over to pick me. there was nothing the night before.
this happened on a Tuesday, I rested in bed the entire week, finally able to get up and around on Saturday, although still a little uneasy. I was fine on Monday and have not had a similar occurrence.
I have haD the flu a few times, and this feeling was so much worse than the flu. I could barely stand up. It took all the coordination that I could muster to take that shower, fortuantely there is some railings in the shower.
96.5 isnt that low. Ignoring room for error, a lot of people can be at 96 or 97 degrees and be healthy. Im consistantly 97. something or a low 98.x. It could be your thyroid, it could be a lot of things. Perhaps you just had an allergy attack.
It’s unlikely you had any of these. We see two common reasons for mildly low temperatures (other than true accidental exposure-related hypothermia): incorrect assessment (one of the reasons a rectal temp has been popular in the past) and the frail elderly who just don’t do as good a job anymore of maintaining their body temps (for all sorts of reasons) even when the ambient environment is not particularly cold.
In healthy younger folk we don’t pay very much attention, although I admit to a habit of asking my nurses to re-do the temp if it’s recorded as below 97.5 or so.