Germ Warfare

This blog is not intended to provide medical information. You can get that from drug commercials on TV. I'm not an expert on cancer, or cancer treatments, or nutrition, or even Reiki. I AM an expert on Rich, and since there are more than a handful of people interested in Rich, this blog seemed like a good idea.

Pardon me please for using this opportunity to make a
Public Service Announcement:

Human Beings were never intended to live in a germ free world. The vast majority of bacteria are good and helpful. If man insists on waging war against bacteria, numbers alone indicate man will lose—their army is way bigger than our army. Bacteria, being quite simple organisms, are capable of mutating and evolving at an alarming rate. Put all these facts together and consider them carefully the next time you disinfect your counter top. Use standard hygiene measures when dealing with raw animal flesh. Beyond that, unless you're planning to perform surgery on your kitchen counter, it does not need to be sterile. If it makes you feel good to “disinfect” your toddler's toys, consider that she also crawls on the floor and then puts her hands in her mouth.

The main incentive for disinfecting anything is the money it puts in the manufacturer's pockets. Basic Economics: If there weren't a profit, the products wouldn't be available. They are NOT selling you a cure for diseases—they are capitalizing on your FEAR.

Humanity has thrived and prospered for thousands of years before waging this war we cannot win. Please consider that there is a difference between being clean and being sterile, despite the commercials on TV. Clean is good, sterile is impossible. Look up the statistics on hospital acquired infection.

Next time you're watching one of those commercials where they shine a special light on the floor around the toilet that turns the bacteria neon blue... ask yourself what you might look like under that light. You'd look like the lost member of a Las Vegas show.

Given the size of their army and their ability to mutate, sterilizing surfaces outside an operating room is doing little more for the Big Picture than immunizing the enemy's population. If you want to take cleaning to the next level, use STEAM—you'll kill just as many without inoculating the rest and bringing toxic chemicals into your environment.

Obviously, I have a dog in this fight. It's hard enough for someone to endure chemo and radiation (I'll spare you the gory details for now) but to go through all of that only to receive the next blow when you're at your miserable weakest. A massive infection that is mega resistant. Take the worst you've ever felt and multiply it by nine. At this level, treatment requires IV antibiotics, which cannot be run through a generic IV like regular fluids and meds. IV Antibiotic treatment requires special care because it is so caustic to the veins. Rich started with a central line inserted on the right side of his neck that is stitched into place. Placement is a sterile procedure that requires Rich lying fully draped from waste up, trying to breath with his face covered for over 30 minutes (45 if a resident does the procedure) Then it must be x-rayed to confirm that the placement is terminating correctly. This site is good for seven days. When that time lapsed, they placed another central line on the left side of his neck, with another x-ray to confirm placement. (and they found the infection had colonized at the first central line site).

After that seven days lapses, the next option is a PICC line. They insert an 18 gauge catheter into the large vein of the upper arm, terminating into the heart. With another x-ray to confirm placement. This so the antibiotics can't disintegrate the veins. To give you an idea: visiting nurse explained that Vancomycin can only be given ONCE in a regular IV because of damage to the veins.

After Twenty-Six days in the hospital for an INFECTION, Rich is finally home.

Now he's on Vancomycin IV twice daily. I can't bleed the IV tubing down a drain because it will totally destroy my septic tank. He gets a blood test weekly to make sure the Vancomycin has not reached toxic levels. They've had to reduce the dose twice now. He gets hellatious headaches. He has to have IV Mycomine daily to deal with the yeast/fungus infections that are out of control because the good bacteria in his body that keeps that in check has been killed as well—vancomycin takes no prisoners.

I apologize if I sound militant on this issue, but I was raised in a time and place where childhood illnesses (not the big ones we immunize for) were part of childhood; Emergency Rooms were not used as 24 hour doctor offices; medication was a last resort when everything else failed, including toughing it out and giving your body a chance to build an immune system. I grew up before drive-thru windows created a demand for the perpetual immediate FIX; the magic pill was an aspirin; and the best medicine was common sense and personal responsibility.

Here's the deal. You have the Right to the Pursuit of Happiness—not the Guarantee of it. Some days you're going to feel like crap—mentally, emotionally, or physically. Deal with it. It's called Growth.

If I had a buck for every patient who called demanding an antibiotic because they've been suffering with sinus pain and pressure for the last three days, I could pay my insurance premiums while I'm on FMLA for Rich. Or the young women who get antibiotics every few months to treat their STD because their boyfriends refuse to use condoms. With a chaser of diflucan to treat the yeast infection the antibiotic causes.

How about patients seeing the doctor for refills on diabetic and hypertensive meds. They're obese and wreak of tobacco and they can't be bothered to show up for their FREE one-on-one nutrition training with a nurse educator.

Ask me how many anti-depressants I call to pharmacies weekly for people in their twenties. WHY? Because they were raised in an environment that doesn't allow anyone to lose because they might feel bad. Guess what. That is not how life works. So now they're trying to function in the real world where no one is adjusting the score so they don't have to deal with disappointment (or the desire to improve).

And NO, I'm not prejudiced against fat, promiscuous, diabetic, depressed smokers with chronic sinusitis. On some level we all do things that are less than healthy. All I'm saying is make your choices and then you be accountable for them.

Medicine did not kill health care in this country. Abuse did—the lack of common sense and personal responsibility. Bring those two back to the playground and we could have a health care system that works for everyone.

Whoa. Sorry. Shit. I might have just offended someone. Damn. There goes MY political career. My problem is that I need to stop thinking. On the bright side, I'm fairly certain I can find a doctor who will write a prescription for a magic pill that will instantly cure me. Or at least alter my brain chemistry so that I no longer care.