The "infectious disease" dilemma

During James very first hospital stay in December of 1998 at only 11 months old, the infectious disease service kept us longer than I wanted to stay. And no hospital stay since then has been any different, including this one.

In the past, though, I have fought to have James discharged so that we could go home and we would treat him there - even if it meant using IV antibiotics at home.

But, the difference this time is that there is ABSOLUTELY NO indication that we have anything to treat. James cultures from his catheter were positive - so it was removed, taking the infection with it. The cultures taken from his arm before AND after the removal of the catheter have been negative. The culture of his spinal fluid was negative. His white count is normal. Yet, infectious disease insists that he has IV vancomycin (one of your strongest antibiotics) simply because James is at risk of infection of his shunts because of the hardware in his head. Well, guess what.....James is at risk of infection of the hardware in his head EVERY DAY OF HIS LIFE.

The problem is that James has not been able to keep an IV line longer than a few hours this entire hospital stay. The last one infiltrated this morning and put vancomycin under his skin, leaving blisters. To give him IV antibiotiocs, we would have to start yet another IV line (torture for James and probably nigh impossible to do) OR take him to the OR and place a PICC line for antibiotics for an infection that does not exist.

To me, the risk of having an overkill of antibiotics - thus putting him at risk of becoming antibiotic-resistant is greater than the risk that his shunts will become infected when there is no visible sign of infection left in him.

So, here we sit.....waiting and waiting.....hoping to get home soon. We'll keep you posted.