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Jmrogers4

Jmrogers4

Joined
Jun 5, 2012
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Jack had a GI check up today and he has had diarrhea for the past 3 days - wake him up in the middle of the night kind. We figured it was from the antibiotic for the cellulitis. He went 3 times while we were at the GI and he was clearly in pain while we were there with tears in his eyes and has dropped 5 lbs since Thursday, but then everything is just running through him and he hasn't wanted to eat.

Told the GI and me that there was no blood. GI wanted sample to rule out C-Diff and Giardia so while we were there Jack went in again and came out with sample in the hat -BLOOD! Blood has never been a symptom of his.

So now I'm sitting waiting for the phone call to see if it is positive for C-Diff or Giardia. Is it bad that I'm almost hoping for that and not a flare. (Of course his eczema seems to be making a comeback)

We are supposed to leave for a long weekend camping in Oregon on Thursday, meeting up with 10 other families and we all have been looking forward to it but I guess we will have to wait and see what we hear from GI.

He wanted to wait for labs and fecal calprotectin until we find out if it is positive for c-Diff or Giardia and then for a week or so after finishing current antibiotics.
 
:hug:
We had that for DS in Jan.
Way more blood than he has ever had -usually he is a dot here or there at most.
No infection- minor flare which got better on its own .

Hope his clears up quickly
 
Do you think the celluliti/antibiotics could have possibly tipped him over into a flare? If it is a flare GI would like to keep him on LDN and add a short dose of steriod. You know me I have to have a plan for the what ifs....
He has him taking immodium today and something to help with the stomach cramps/spasms.
 
No advice here just wanted to send hugs! Hope it is something that can be cleared up quickly!!
 
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Hey Jacqui...

:( Ugh and GRRRR... Sucky disease...

For my crew (all of us, IBDer and non-IBDers) antibiotics *always* cause diarrhea and omnicef causes red poop :ywow: - umm.. yeah...).

For his eczema (willing to offer any hope here...) my eczema is running rampant - I think it's in the air this time of year.

I pray he's okay...

Crohn's - :voodoo: just saying...

(((hugs)))
 
Thanks Shell, I'll take whatever to keep my bubble intact. Was going to hear back this evening but don't think it's going to happen till tomorrow
 
Bright red is good I have been told that means a hemorid or irrations from going to the bath room my stool is black I'm bleeding in the small bowel and usually do with a flare up!!!! Glad they are testing did the dr say bright red was good????
 
Bright red is not necessarily good just means lower in the Gi tract .
So if you lower colon or rectum is inflamed and flaring then the blood is bright red.
Lots of sigmoid and rectal issues here ;)

( yeah DS didn't get the rectum sparing crohn's memo either)
 
Gosh, Jacqui... :( I can imagine your worry! I do hope it's simply the antibiotics!! I know I've read here that some take probiotics at the same time when on antibiotics to alleviate antibiotic impact. I don't know more about it than that but as antibiotics can have an impact, it is possible that this is what's causing Jack's symptoms. :ghug:

I hope you hear back from the GI soon!! And, if it does turn out to be something more, glad you already have a plan in place! I know it helps to know 'where you're going'... if necessary. :hug:
 
When I got crohn's disease for the first time, I bled a lot. For what it's worth, it was bright red, and it was from the terminal ileum, not the colon. I don't know how true it is that blood that is bright red is from the colon, it wasn't for me, nothing was seen in my colon during colonscopy, all the blood came from the terminal ileum, and it was bright red.

Blood cloths tend to look a bit darker though. The first time I saw them as a kid I thought it was intestine. As I was explained in ER, if it was intestine, it would look pretty colorless, intestine tends to look muted, grey / black / green. Clotted (sp?) blood tends to look dark red and slimy for lack of a better word.

I had C. diff testing, took a few days, it was positive once, but negative after a few days. You don't tend to bleed with mild C. Diff, although if left untreated the toxins from the C. diff will start to irritate the gut lining which can result in bleeding, but it's likely just the CD.

Antibiotics that tend to create a C. diff overgrowth are the broad spectrum ones, ones that kill both gram+ (c. diff) and gram-, it's also dangerous for enterococcus overgrowth, which often goes together with c. diff overgrowth. I do use probiotics when I use antibiotics, if it helps I don't know.
 
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So before I was Dx I had a lot of red blood my family dr told me it was fine!!! That is do nice he also told me I had IBS 10 Years ago when it was problem Crohn's with all the scar tissue that I have!!!!!!
 
My son has had both, we had the red blood investigated and it was coming from his TI, earlier at the time of dx the there was black blood, also TI.
 
So Kiny they had him on 2 different antibiotics - Bactrim and Cephalex (or something like that). GI told us today to quit the Bactrim the other one should have been enough unless they had done cultures that showed it was warranted, no cultures done.
I've had him eating yogurt every day and he has taken a probiotic for the last 3 days, GI says wont hurt but the antibiotics were most likely killing those off as well but to go ahead and keep taking.
Dx is in TI among other areas - No phone call tonight and it is now after 9:00 so I guess I will have to wait until tomorrow. ARGHHH! I have one of those Mike's frozen lemonades in the freezer, I think it is time to have one.
 
Jmrogers4 said:
So Kiny they had him on 2 different antibiotics - Bactrim and Cephalex (or something like that). GI told us today to quit the Bactrim the other one should have been enough unless they had done cultures that showed it was warranted, no cultures done.
I've had him eating yogurt every day and he has taken a probiotic for the last 3 days, GI says wont hurt but the antibiotics were most likely killing those off as well but to go ahead and keep taking.
Dx is in TI among other areas - No phone call tonight and it is now after 9:00 so I guess I will have to wait until tomorrow. ARGHHH! I have one of those Mike's frozen lemonades in the freezer, I think it is time to have one.
Click to expand...

Ah, more and more antibiotics are broad spectrum, because of the increased resistance. Cephalosporin used to be much more narrow spectrum. But each time more resistant strains emerge from antibiotics use, they make stronger and stronger antibiotics, Cipro used to be only for serious infections, and they started handing it out to everyone, now bacteria are far more resistant, antibiotics far stronger, and the gut flora is damaged much more, which leaves people very vulnerable to C. diff and enterococcus. One of these days there will be a strain that can't be treated anymore.

C. diff has very different strains too, there's some that produce very nasty toxins, which damage the gut. It's the toxins that are the issue with C. diff, I didn't have a bad strain, so it cleared up.

Not sure if yoghurt and probiotics help a lot, I take them sometimes, it can't hurt really.
 
Still waiting!!!! I called the GI's office and the receptionist told me it would probably be after 4 when they would call ARGGHHH.
Good news, no diarrhea although I would attribute that to the immodium I think. He has not taken any more since last night though. Still having some stomach cramping but the meds are helping that as well and he did just eat. He said he was starving but afraid to eat. I convinced him he was just going to have to try. That was about 1/2 hour ago so we will see...
In the meantime, I'm still packing for our trip this weekend, we are supposed to leave tomorrow so I'm in my bubble where I hope to stay
 
Hmm, waiting on tests results is really nerve-racking, I felt alone a lot, just waiting for a call. The hospital gave me the phone number of the lab now, and they can tell me what they're doing and I know the people who do the tests now, which made me a lot more relaxed and happier. Maybe a good idea if the opportunity ever arises, I know it calmed me a lot.
 
I think I have friends in every part of the hospital except the lab. I think I need to make some new friends :) 3:38 here. waiting.... waiting....
 
Ok I have to go for my afternoon walk but I will be chanting "Call now, call now, call now" to keep my pace!
 
So Frustrated!!! Nurse was supposed to call yesterday that they needed another sample as they did not get enough with the first one then got busy today so forgot to call again. So here we are waiting for him to go - Hat is in the toilet. She did look up a pharmacy near where we will be in Oregon. Lab is open for another 2 hours to drop off or we can drop off at ER. The GI's office is closed on Friday. They have alerted lab to put a Rush on it when it comes in. So instead of chanting call now, chant Poop Now, Poop Now.
In the meantime they okay'd us to o on trip but just watch him closely. We have a RV trailer for camping and we are going to a place with full hook up so we'll have comforts of home and he can rest if needed and a bathroom.
 
Aww...man what a bummer! I hope all goes smoothly and your trip is wonderful. I will just chant poop now during supper!! Ha
 
Hopefully, he is beginning to improve (and it's not just the immodium)! And hope all goes well while you are away but having a trailer nearby to rest etc. is a nice 'back-up' plan. :)
 
Oh man Jm. :ghug: I hope your lad is on the improve, bless him. :heart:

I hope the results aren't too far away and all is well with them!

Just a little heads up although it may not be the case with Jack...my two get stomach cramping with Imodium and are a little loathe to take it for that reason unless necessary.

Safe travels!

Dusty. xxx
 
Thinking of you Jm! :hug::hug::hug:

Sending loads of love, luck and healing thoughts your way. :heart:

Dusty. xxx
 
understand that wait ((((((Hugs))))))). Hope you have a great time camping-it is my full time life in a RV
 
Just seeing this thread. How's Jack now? Hoping it was all from the antibiotics and will be short lived. Since you didn't post yesterday, I hope you are currently on your trip and everything is going well.
 
Sorry I missed all this Jacqui! I hope whatever it is, it's soon resolved! To the lab it's just ho-hum another sample! Someone should make them realize that somewhere a mother's sanity is hinging on those results!
 
Came into town to check messages where I have cell service and there was a message from the nurse this morning about calling in the Rx from Dr.'s message last night. What! He must have called the home phone so now I'm waiting for my mother to call me, I sent her to my house to listen to message. Oh and the sample came at 1 am so I had to drive to ER to drop it off.
 
Mom just called C-Diff positive so trying now to get a hold of GI office they are closed on Fridays but someone is supposed to be there. Until 2 of course it is not anyone that would answer a phone
 
Ugh no Jm. :(

Did you manage to get on to anyone?

Thinking of you! :heart:

Dusty. xxx
 
Oh no, so sorry to hear C diff came back positive, hope it is cleared quickly! Hope you are having fun on the trip!
 
Sorry to hear he has c diff, but glad it's not a flare as well. I hope you are able to start him on something soon. How's he feeling?
 
Oh sorry about the c-diff (didn't see your post when I posted above). I hope it can be cleared up fairly quickly!!! :ghug:

How's he feeling?
 
We are back, had a good time but he was definitely not 100%. A lot of bathroom visits with us taking a little walk after so he could give me the details IYKWIM. He took a few naps during the day. He even sat on my lap one even at the campfire and fell asleep.
It didn't stop him from doing any of the activities he wanted to do though, went horseback riding, stand-up paddle boarding, waterskiing, tubing on the back of the boat, fishing. We love the area we went and try and go every other year and we seem to talk more people into it. We had 10 families this year and there were 22 kids ranging from 9-17.

Managed to driving into nearest town on Friday to get the Flagyll. He didn't eat a lot and I didn't push him too much so this week I think we will up the supplemental EN and work on rest and getting rid of the C-Diff.

Will call the GI today to see what we need to do about follow up
 
Glad he was able to enjoy the camping activities and I hope the C diff is taken care of quickly!
 
Sorry I seem to have missed all this. Glad he enjoyed himself. Hope the c.diff clears up quickly!
 
Your post sounds kind of bittersweet to me Jacqui! Thirteen yr old boys don't fall asleep in their mothers laps when everything is hunky dory. Still, glad he had fun! Hope he feels better soon!
 
Yes, my thoughts exactly Dex, especially when all the other kids are around their own campfire at the site next door.

Several episodes of D today, anybody with any experience know how long it should take for Flagyll to work?
 
I thougt it was supposed to work fairly quickly... like 24 hours or so? Unless it is causing the diarrhea (like it did for DS). Really hope things turn around soon.
 
Yah, most antibiotic kill within hours afaik.

C Diff can be nasty because some the bacteria form spores in the intestine. That's how the things survive, and why they can survive on a door handle for days. That's why anthrax is so dangerous, it forms spores and survives for days on everything you put it on. Same with E Coli (linked to crohn's disease), it survives in biofilms, they're doing studies using mannosides, instead of antibiotics, because antibiotics are ineffective, the mannosides break down the biofilms.
 
Well Crap! that is what I was afraid of, the GI office didn't call back today, guess I'll start calling in the morning to find out what they want us to do.
Thanks Mehita, Kiny.
Kiny, you are a rock star! - thanks for the explanation.
 
I read that there is some improvement in 1-2 days with resolution of diarrhea in 3 to 6 days. This was for Cdiff in adults (no mention of Crohn's) and I'm not sure what severity of disease this was based on. It says failure to resolve after 6 to 7 days is considered a treatment failure. It could be different in kids with Crohn's.

http://cid.oxfordjournals.org/content/46/Supplement_1/S32.full

Historically, patients should show some symptomatic improvement within 1 or 2 days after the initiation of therapy, with a mean time to diarrhea resolution of 3–6 days, as shown in earlier randomized treatment trials.
Click to expand...
 
Hi! Sorry to hear your son has c-diff...my daughter had it in Feb of this year. She was so sick that I was sure she was in a full blown flare! At that time, Liv was also on LDN. She never tolerated Flagyl in the past, so MD put her on vancomycin. Symptoms improved within 2 days and she tolerated vanco great. The only problem was once we finished the 10 day course of vanco, she was good for a week than c-diff was back! So we started another round of vanco....same story again. Apparently, those final doses need to be pulsated to ensure killing off all spores. This time our MD started Liv on Dificid..a fairly new drug for c-diff and it finally took care of the infection. Liv was also started on Florastor probiotics...research it, it helps to get infection under control. Liv was taking 3 Florastor a day as well as regular probiotics(at least 4 hours away from the antibiotic dose). The Florastor can be given with the antibiotic because it is yeast. Liv is still on Florastor today (1/day)...it really is good stuff and I am terrified of c-diff returning. I hope your son is feeling better today! Good Luck! Kim
 

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