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High White Blood Cell Count

K

Katrina77

Hey guys,


I'm 23 years old and was recently diagnosed with Rheumatoid Arthritis, and still under suspicion of Crohn's Disease. I've been on Medrol 24mg for about a month, also prednisone before the Medrol, but it didn't work very well. Two days ago I was supposed to start Humira but got very sick with a fever 100.4, awful nausea, no appetite whats so ever, completely black stools and abdominal pain. My doc sent me to the ER, and my white blood cell count was elevated to 15,000. They wanted to let me go home but I was so sick that I asked them to admit me, and they did. They ran a few other tests but nothing special, and the next morning the white blood cell count was 19,000 (that was just a 5-6 hour difference in between two tests). Today it's back at 15,000 but the doc had no explanation for its rising and he let me go home. My GI said that it's probably from the steroid, though 5 days ago my blood was completely normal. Also my Rheumatologist said it's too high for it to be a steroid effect. I anyways got a Humira shot today, but still concerned about how I'm feeling and my blood count. Have anyone ever experienced something like that?

Thanks for your help! :)
 
L

Lintel

OH has been pretty sick recently and his WBC has been similar to yours when he has had infection. It might be that your body still has abit of infection there from the fever.. It could be the steroid but if highly doubt it. Just make sure you monitor yourself well and don't let any infection spread or get worse get to your ER if your feeling really unwell.
All the best. X
 
L

Lintel

Kaminszakr said:
Just wanted to know if 17 is high or low. Still don't know from reading this. Where can I find understandable ranges?
Click to expand...
So your range should be between 4-10 on a "normal" body if You could say that. OH has crohns and 12 is not a high reading particularly for him but I would be concerned if it was 17. Your CRP will give an even more acurate reading of this they should be below 6 but commonly in crohns They are elevated especially if the disease is active.
So 17 is high yes and I would want to find the cause of it if I were you.
All the best x
 
G

Guerrero

Both steroid and infection/fever could make your WBC higher, i'd not worry too much.

Black stool could mean you arr bleeding inside your upoer gi tract, how was your hemoglobin?

Anyway hopefully humira will solve it all soon.
 
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