IV Drug Users at risk of this CURABLE Neurological Disease

[SarahO]

This disease can manifest in many ways, with facial palsy, with nerve palsies, with many CNS manifestations you wouldn't think of at first. SEIZURES!!! Encephalopathy! Etc! Osteomyelitis, Myositis, Myelitis, Radiculitis, Transverse Myelitis, Arthritis, Chronic Demyelinating Polyneuropathy

TREATMENT is with QUINOLINES_ Levaquin, Cipro!!! QUINOLINES!!!

OkAy, if you are an IV drug user (I'm not, I was a vodka & valium person myself) you are at high risk for: BARTONELLA aka cat scratch disease.

Doctors almost always test ONLY FOR BARTONELLA HENSELAE, the kinds cats are most likely to transmit-

BUT BARTONELLA WAS DISCOVERED TO BE TICK BORNE IN 1999!!!

It is in ticks!!! http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12135237?ordinalpos=2&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

If you HAVE BEEN or are an IV DRUG USER
THE ODDS ARE YOU WOULD BARTONELLA ELIZABETHAE
NOT Henselae!!!

There are MANY human pathogenic strains- and if you test for ONE and get a negative it does not mean you don't have ANOTHER strain!! The most common test for Bartonella tests ONLY for Bartonella HENSELAE which is NOT THE MOST COMMON KIND. I know, stupid, eh? MDs have to catch up with the reseacrh, it takes time...

See these remarkable statistics!!!

New York: IV Drug Users 46% found with JUST B. elizabethae - 46%!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11791987?ordinalpos=3&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum


Sweden: IV Drug Users 39% seropositive for JUST B. elizabethae - 39%!!!

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12860665?ordinalpos=7&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum


Los Angeles: Homeless People 12.5% to Bartonella elizabethae,
9.5% positive to Bartonella QUINTANA and 3.5% to bartonella Henselae-
a grand total in LOS ANGELES of % positive for SOME Bartonella strain:
thats 25%!!!! 25%!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12447746?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

Bartonella quintana, the agent of "trench fever", was found in a 4000 year old human tooth. It is a microbe that has been around a very very very long time!!!!!!! http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15655785?ordinalpos=3&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVDocSum

Good paper about Bartonella in humans by Bruno Chomel of UC Davis:
http://tech.research.usf.edu/cm/pdf/Zoonotics/Bartonella_AVMA.pdf

BARTONELLA SYMPTOMS

GENERAL: Fatigue, Restlessness, Combative behavior, Myalgias, Malaise, Liver and/or Spleen involvement, Abdominal pain, Infectious Mononucleosis-like Syndrome, Granulomatous Hepatitis

BRAIN: Encephalopathy may occur 1-6 weeks after the initial infection and is fairly common in patients with Bartonella. Note: Approximately 50 percent of patients who develop Encephalopathy can be affected by seizures (from focal to generalized, and from brief and self-limited to status epilepticus). Headaches, Cognitive Dysfunction, and CNS Lesions may be evident.

RASH AND LYMPHADENITIS: Erythematous papules (red splotches or slightly raised red spots) may develop. Such papules occasionally occur on the lower limbs but are more common on the upper limbs, the head, and neck. The papules may appear on the skin or mucous membranes. Bartonella may also cause subcutaneous nodules, with some bone involvement possible. The nodules may show some hyperpigmentation, be tender, fester, and/or be enlarged or swollen, but not always.

EYES: Conjunctivitis, Bartonella Neuroretinitis, Loss of Vision, Flame Shaped Hemorrhages, Branch Retinal Artery Occlusion with Vision Loss, Cotton Wool Exudates, Parinaud’s Oculoglandular Syndrome,and Papilledema.


BONES AND MUSCLES: Osteomyelitis, Myositis, Osteolytic Lesions (softening of bone), Myelitis, Radiculitis, Transverse Myelitis, Arthritis, Chronic Demyelinating Polyneuropathy.

HEART: Endocarditis, Cardiomegaly.

Possible lab findings: The following may show up during standard testing:
Thrombocytopenia, pancytopenia, anemia, elevated serum alkaline phosphatase level, elevated bilirubin, abnormal liver enzymes. X-ray of the bone may show areas of lysis or poorly-defined areas of corticl destruction with periosteal reaction. Cardiomegaly may show up on a chest X-Ray.

Biopsies of lymph nodes reveal pathology often indistinguishable from sarcoidosis. Reports of biopsies strongly suggestive of lymphoma do occur.
Tests occasionally show an enlarged liver with multiple hypodense areas scattered throughout the parenchyma.

[SarahO]

Another reason homeless people get Bartonella is because it is carried by LICE!

Trench fever is a kind of Bartonella- so is Carrions disease- so is cat scratch fever- each is a different strain- there are MANY human pathogenic strains-

[SarahO]

know that the prevalence of these diseases is also high (although not as high as the homeless or IV drug users) worldwide among what seem to the healthy!!!

Occurrence of Bartonella henselae & B quintana in a healthy Greek population.

19.8% were seropositive to B. henselae

15% were seropositive to B. quintana

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12812344?ordinalpos=1&itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsP anel.Pubmed_RVAbstractPlus

[MelodyL]

I'm going to ask a really dumb question. You'll have to excuse me but I'm over 60 and back in my day, we had Pot, Cocaine, and heroin.

I have no idea what an IV drug user is.

I know that IV is for intravenous. People put drugs in an IV drip and shoot up?

I had no idea.

What kind of drugs do people use an IV for??

And I'm being completely honest here.

I thought people either smoked week, smoked crack, and shot up with heroin.

I've really never heard of IV drug use.

Oh, I'm thinking, maybe this is shooting up with Heroin, and that is known as IV DRUG USE??

Am I correct?

Don't even bother replying, because I immediately realized how stupid the question was after I asked Alan. He said "IV" means in the arm. I said "well, now they must think I'm a complete idiot".

Thanks anyway.

Melody

[houghchrst]

Melody here is a spot where you can get a quick lesson on the different basic types. Easy to understand and quick to the point. Really though you would be surprised and some of the bizarre things that people will do for a high.

http://www.drug-addiction.com/drug_types.htm

Everything from guzzling mouth wash to smoking ginseng. I am sure there are some odder tales out there.

[MelodyL]

WELL!!!! didn't I get an education today!!!!!!

I learned about Crack cocaine. About heroin (poppy seeds), when I read about where heroin comes from the first thing I thought of was "Why don't people just buy the plants and ground up the poppy seeds??"

I knew NONE of what I read. Food was my choice, not drugs or alcohol.

One thing that I'm curious about. Kids today know more about alcohol, tobacco and drug use than we ever did back in the day. They just know more stuff.

So when I read the following:

"Medical consequences of chronic heroin abuse include scarred and/or collapsed veins, bacterial infections of the blood vessels and heart valves, abscesses (boils) and other soft-tissue infections, and liver or kidney disease. Lung complications (including various types of pneumonia and tuberculosis) may result from the poor health condition of the abuser as well as from heroin's depressing effects on respiration. Many of the additives in street heroin may include substances that do not readily dissolve and result in clogging the blood vessels that lead to the lungs, liver, kidneys, or brain. This can cause infection or even death of small patches of cells in vital organs. Immune reactions to these or other contaminants can cause arthritis or other rheumatologic problems."


WHY THE HECK WOULD ANYONE PUT THIS STUFF IN THEIR BODIES??

I'm dead serious. Don't teens know that this stuff could kill their blood vessels, and give them a slow death?

Why would anyone say "Oh, I'm going to do heroin, I'm sure I'll like it"??

I ask this because THERE HAD TO BE A FIRST TIME TO DO THIS.

These people are not 7 years old. These people read and write and know stuff, don't they??

I am dead serious here. It's like when teen decides to smoke because all his friends are smoking. But today, it says right on the pack of cigarettes "Cigarette smoking is dangerous to your health". or something similar. What do these people think "I'll put a butt in my mouth, I'll get a buzz but I won't die....I can't die, I'm immortal".

Same thing with Crack, heroin, whatever. Kids know what this stuff is. It's worse than tobacco right?? I mean tobacco is LEGAL. Bad, but LEGAL!!!

This crack cocaine, heroin, etc. is not only illegal, but it's DEADLY.

So why do people START in the first place??

I'm really curious.

[houghchrst]

For me I can tell you honestly that I really had no idea. I mean yeah sure we knew don't drink and drive, doing drugs is illegal but it seems to me all we learned was from a legal standpoint. No one told me that doing LSD could cause brain bleeds into my spinal fluid. That alcohol is caustic and burns everything it comes across in your system at a cellular level. I didn't know that people are willing to lose their children so that they can do drugs instead. I didn't learn that until I had hit bottom in my life and had to start outpatient rehab.

Also there is the belief that I will try it. I won't become addicted. I will only do it at parties. Well he/she has been doing it for a while so it can't be too bad. They just say that to scare us. I will never get that bad. At that age we think we are, to a point, invincible.

Society thinks that the best way to teach our children to stay away from drugs is to tell them they will go to jail. They don't show them the emaciated corpses of the oded crack addict they picked up last night, the drunk they scraped off the tree this morning. The brain dead teenager who oded on ecstasy at the party last weekend. I say march them through. Start educating them young.

I started teaching my 16 yr old at a very young age. He is Bipolar and comes from a long line of addicts, his father is a crack addict and a current user. My son is automatically high risk. He sees and is aware of what it does to lives on a first sight basis. He is reminded regularly of how at risk he is. He has lost a lot of friendships to drugs but hangs in there. We talk regularly. I fear for him regularly.

[Junie]

My older sister did all the drugs back in early seventies, Lsd, speed, pot, you name it, all to fit in with the rich kids (we were poor), I learned by her mistakes! She is all cured now, she drinks beer and smokes pot daily, but it is safe and legal (or should be, she says)!

[Junie]

Oh yes, her DD while on vacation last month went on and on how the Lord cured her of her Xanax addiction....I had to ask why her did not cure here of the beer, wine and pot at the same time!! We don't get along for some reason (my mom's side of family) and Dad's are all dead or just never knew them!

[houghchrst]

A lot of my son's friends have taken to stealing their parents psych drugs or then again there is always the parent who sells their meds with their teen being the dealer.

Some may find that shocking to hear. I find it disgusting to write. And sad. One of my son's best friends, they had a little group that was dedicated to not doing drugs, just not long ago was taken to the hospital because he was found in a bathtub full of ice cold water passed out from an overdose of Xanax and they still don't know what else.

There are also the parents who are of the mind, I would rather let my teen drink or smoke pot here at home, at least I know where my kid is at. That was the way my mother thought. I graduated to crack as I got older. She regrets it to this day but cannot go back and change it of course. I like to think that maybe it was meant to be so that maybe I can help others.

[MelodyL]

Wow, all these stories. I never would have believed that parents allow drugs in the house if I didn't know a couple personally who did just that.

This was over 30 years ago. The parents smoked pot every single night. They inherited a house, they are now in foreclosure because all their money goes to drugs.

They are in their late 50's now. I always thought drug use was among the young. I have found this not to be the case.

But what I found very disturbing was that when they go to visit their son who is 37 years old and lives in a mansion with a pool, that they ALL SMOKE POT TOGETHER.

I have never heard of such a thing in all my life. The guy's wife is trying to get pregnant so she's the only one who doesn't smoke pot.

I think it gets to the brain and they rationalize that "well, we're still alive, we still get a buzz, so what's wrong with it?"

It's amazing how the mind rationalizes these things.

I think parents should stop trying to be their kid's best friend and start acting like parents.

That means "no smoking, no drugs, no alcohol" in the house.

Yeah, from my lips to god's ears!!!!


Thanks to you all for informing me about what's going on in today's drug culture.

I really learned a lot.

Melody

[houghchrst]

Well I hate to say it but you're welcome lol. I wish more people knew. Parents who have small children and are naive to what their children will meet when they get older.

Now you have a bit of insight into what makes your friend and her son tick, drugs and alcohol alter the neural pathways that your brain uses so just quitting the addiction is a bit harder than what the average non user thinks.

Okay well enough. Geez, I remembered and know more than I really wanted to lol.

I hope you have a great day and that your friend and her son find their way.

[MelodyL]

HI Christina

Thanks so much.

I have a close friend who drinks, but her son is full blown alcoholic. I've posted a story on these threads. I wanted to help them. I found out I cannot do this. They have to help themselves.

The 30 year old with the drinking problem was just released form the hospital with his 4 bout of Pancreatitis (this is where I go nuts and can't understand why a grown man who has Pancreatitis, and a bad liver, would come out and start drinking beer again). But after reading about the cravings, well I understand this mind set a bit better.

The other day, my friend (the mother of the alcoholic), called up AA and spoke to some people there and she arranged for 2 men to come to the house last night to do (not an intervention), but to explain to the 30 year old what AA is all about. (he has made it perfectly clear that he wants NO PART OF AA or any rehab).

But I gather she had to try one final time.

So she calls up the guys and the guy says "we are coming over at 6:30 p.m."

She asked me "should I tell my son?' I said 'cmon, get real, if you tell him, he'll leave the house"

Well she told him yesterday morning. She just said 'I know you don't want to hear this but I am having 2 guys from AA come and they want to speak to you about the program".

Well, he lost it, yelled at her, screamed and said; "I want no part of this" and left the house. He never came back last night, so she had to call up the guys and tell them "Thanks but no thank".

It's amazing what a parent will do to save their child. I find it absolutely amazing.

I understand about Mother Love and all that, but there has to come a time when one realizes "I cannot save this person, he has to want to be helped".

I do not think she has gotten to this point yet.

Oh well, it's a hard road.

Thanks to you all for sharing all the info on drug use. I really do understand the cravings much better now.

[houghchrst]

Yes I have read and posted about your friend and her son. She needs help herself. She sabotaged the meeting.

She enables him.

My mother is 62 and an alcoholic. My middle brother is 39 and an alcoholic. He lives between her house and his lady friend's house. My mother is recently retired from the postal service. She went out on a disability retirement. She was a functioning alcoholic. She went into work at 3pm came home at 12:30am with her bottle of wine and got hammered, went to bed and then did it all over again. Never went to work drunk.

Now she is more disabled but has reached a point where she will not go to the doctor, she has kidney disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, two bulging disks and a few other things. She still takes her scrips because she is living off of refills from her last hospital trip. Last fall she was drunk and fell in the bathroom and fractured two of her vertebraes. She came home and laid on the couch refusing to do any of the physical therapy, wouldn't wear the brace, just getting worse. Continued to drink only now she is drinking earlier and earlier in the day. Soon she is drinking as soon as she gets up. In the meantime my brother is bringing her food, helping her wash, when she does, doing housework, working in yard, buying her booze (she is buying his too because he doesn't work). She calls me crying on a Saturday saying she has hit bottom, she wants to check into a facility, psych ward, suicidal, on Monday. I beg let's do it now. No let's do it Monday. Tuesday comes no call. She has moved to the bedroom and no longer gets out of bed. Finally she calls me and leaves me a message saying that I need to call her lawyer and have her deemed incompetent because she obviously isn't going to check in to facility.

I start making calls and finally figure this is stupid and go to house and get her out of bed and take her to ER still half drunk. They evaluate her, keep her for couple of days, deem her in no danger, get her health stable and send her home. Tell her to check into inpatient treatment. I give her list of facilities that will accept her insurance, that sound like nice places, she is picky. Today it is almost 5pm and I am sure she has probably started drinking. By eight she will be smashed. My brother has already probably been there, gotten smashed, slept, staggered back to his lady friend's house.

My mother and I are very close but I have had to distance myself in the last two months because I have come to realize that she wants the help but is unwilling to do the work. I have done my part. I gave her the list of places all she needs to do is pick a primary care doctor and make an appt and then pick a place for treatment. I will be right by her side all the way. I don't think I can bare to watch any more. Who will take care of her when she can no longer walk?

My brother will have to be booted which I think may be a deterrent to her getting help because she cannot remain sober while he drinks, it does not work that way.

She has tried to make us promise that when she passes we will take care of him but none of us is willing. He is an adult.

Okay my story is done. There is more but this thread I am feared has been hijacked and I feel bad. Plus I have gone off on a side trip.

[MelodyL]

Oh Christina:

Wow, am I getting an education or what? Good Lord. What you have been through.

My mom also drank. I thought it was normal to come home at 3 pm after school and see one's mom sitting at the kitchen table with a glass of scotch in her hand. It was always scotch. I really thought all moms did this.

Much later on in life, did my father tell me that people came up to him and said "Buddy, you better get a handle on your wife, she has a drinking problem". I was over 40 at the time. Seems alcohol is at an all time high.

It really does seem that way.

Oh, what do you mean that my friend sabotaged the meeting? I think she should have never told her son but she said "what if he goes out, I have to make sure he's home".

I found that reasoning logical, but I really think they could have found a time when he WAS at home, then called up the guys.

And why would she sabotage the meeting? She's the one who called up the guys in the first place.

I'm confused.

Melody

[houghchrst]

Her urge to help her son is strong, she is a mother. I don't know maybe she didn't but she knows in the back of her mind that in all reality she needs to quit drinking too. In his mind what right does she have to have them come and lecture him about his abuse when she is just as bad. What is she going to do if her son starts telling them her "dirty little secret". She may have guilt or began to feel like a hypocrite.

Maybe not, maybe it was just as simple as her being afraid he would not be home, but in her position would you really have expected the son to stay there, honestly, if you were him would you have? She may very well have had time to think about it and decided that her addiction was at risk so she may have sabotaged the meeting. Maybe in her mind it wasn't in those exact terms.

People are funny and can do things that they aren't even aware of especially when it comes to addictions.