Some Disquiet on New Year's Day
On New Year's Day last Sunday, I was experiencing more pain, redness, and reddish-yellow pus discharge from my exit site than the day before, when I had felt and saw some of the same. I complained enough about it for Linda to wisely advise me to call the after-hours dialysis nurse. They in turn said I should go to the ER immediately and get treatment. I would need to obtain a culture of the pus and get antibiotics as soon as possible.
We drove to El Camino Hospital and checked in. I sat with Linda and we went over what must have happened. A few nights ago, I'd woken up with the catheter loosened from the tape that normally anchors it to my skin. I'd been using Vaseline petroleum jelly for the dry skin around the area, and perhaps got too much onto the tape, which probably caused it to detach. Without anchoring down the line, some yanking may have occurred in my sleep. That would've caused the skin around the exit site to break just enough to get exposed to what we later learned from the culture was a staph infection.
Linda at the ER waiting room.
A doctor saw me a few hours later. I was to get an IV drip for vancomycin antibiotic drip at the hospital. She also prescribed me a couple more antibiotics to take for the next couple of weeks, and swabbed for a culture of the pus. Finally, she drew a circle around the red area on my skin with a black Sharpie, and told me to monitor it and see if it ever went beyond that area over time.
The doctor left, and a nurse came in. He stuck a big needle in my left arm for the antibiotic drip and gave me the remote. The TV was full of crappy programming. I switched it off and started to read the new biography of Krazy Kat creator George Herriman on my iPad. Before too long, however, I started experiencing a powerfully itchy sensation on my scalp and neck. After googling for side effects of vancomycin intravenous and confirming that itching was one of them, Linda called the nurse back in. He seemed surprised that I was feeling itchy, and joked that I maybe had dandruff. I actually do, but that's being treated with a prescription shampoo, so I knew this was from the vancomycin.
The nurse called for a Benadryl IV. It hit immediately with a subtle blooming sensation in my chest and throat, like the afterglow from downing some concoction of a whiskey mixed with a delicate fairyland potion. Pulses of warmth radiated from inside and throughout my body. I forgot about how incredibly itchy I'd just been, as I started to nod off, my sweatshirt wrapped around me, and the constant loud moans of the patient in the room next to me greying out, as I floated into an antihistamine-induced sleepiness.
After finishing up the vancomycin, I was discharged. Since then, I've been seeing my dialysis nurse, John, twice a week to monitor the exit site. Luckily, it looks like the antibiotics are doing their job. The redness has shrunk in size and saturation, and there's no more pus. I think it's safe to say I've managed to dodge this bullet. I will be much more careful about the tape anchoring my catheter in the future.
My sincere thanks to the staff at El Camino Hospital for helping me get through this headache that kicked off 2017.
Nigel in Triage, getting his blood pressure taken. I love how Linda draws. It reminds me of James Marshall's George and Martha style.