I am not a medical professional, just to get THAT out of the way. However, I have had a rather lengthy episode of MRSA myself.
I had an abcess/cyst/NASTY wound on my arm, starting in August. My doctor first gave me some oral antibiotics (Erythromycin, I’m allergic to penicillin and Levaquin) and told me to come back in about a week. A week later, the infection was bigger, badder, and nastier than before, and I was ready to have someone lance the sucker. Apparently, not only did the erythromycin not kill the infection, but it considered the stuff to be vitamins. Anyway, my doctor told me that I was going to go into the hospital that afternoon, do not go home and collect my stuff, do not pass Go, no arguments. Her office is in a hospital/doctor’s building, so she got me checked right in. I called my husband and made up a list of stuff I wanted in the hospital. I was able to bring in an old laptop, but we couldn’t figure out a way to hook up my PS2 to the hospital TV without major alterations to the TV hookup. Darnit.
At the hospital, I was allowed to wander around if I wanted to, but frankly I didn’t feel like doing much of anything. I HURT, and I was very tired. I kept my door closed, but that was because of my preference for going around in just my panties, which tends to distress people who are going about their business in the hallway. I did have a sticker on my door, a few of them, actually. One was about the MRSA, another was a notice that I’m a fall risk, and another was that I was allowed a late-night snack.
The nurses and other medical people always washed their hands before and after tending to me, and always put on a fresh pair of gloves when they had to handle me. I don’t know if that was because of the MRSA, or if it was just general procedure. I’d like to think that the handwashing was SOP. My sheets were changed three times a week, and I think that they went into the general laundry bin. My room was also cleaned three times a week, unless I had spilled something or otherwise made a mess in it. I guess that if I’d wet or soiled the bed that the sheets would have been promptly changed, but this didn’t happen, and I wasn’t about to experiment.
My treatment was complicated by the fact that I developed another allergy to an antibiotic, this time to Vancomycin. THAT was fun. I got the IV started late in the evening, and a little while later I broke out in a spectacular rash, started itching all over, and generally felt unwell. So I hollered for the nurse, who cleared things up with some IV Benadryl. IV medications tend to hit quicker and harder than medications by mouth, which is why doctors will prescribe them.
A couple of days into my hospital stay, my doctor had a PICC line put into me. This is like an industrial strength IV line, the catheter goes from the crook of the elbow to the tip of the heart. This gave me the heebie jeebies when it was put in place, and I still have the scar from it. However, it is sturdier than a regular IV catheter, and blood can be drawn from it without having to stick the patient again. So THAT was good.
After a funfilled week at the hospital, during which I learned that it is, indeed, possible to survive on 1000 Calories a day (but it’s no fun), the doctor felt that I was well enough to go home if I had a home health care nurse give me an IV antibiotic treatment every day. I wasn’t wild about the IV treatments, but I was quite ready to come home. Neither my regular doctor nor the infectious diseases doctor warned me to stay away from other people, however they both knew that I was still very tired from all the antibiotics in my system.
I took the IV treatment at home for a couple or three weeks, and I STILL had the infection. It was better, but it wasn’t clearing up like it should. So the infectious diseases doctor put me on a new oral antibiotic called Zyvox. It was very expensive, and she had to get special permission from my insurance company, but it worked. I still have a scar on my arm from the wound, but the infection is completely gone.
MRSA is nasty. I really think that the carers should know if they have someone who might pass the infection to them, so that they can take precautions. ESPECIALLY if any of the carers have a compromised immune system.
