Replies

...to prevent half a million deaths worldwide from a common bloodstream infection.

Sepsis is not "a" bloodstream infection. It is just a generic term to mean any infection that gets out of hand to the point that it invades the bloodstream.

I was just about to clarify what sepsis is - but you did it, thanks.

I almost died from pneumonia-based sepsis in 1982. Thank God the fifth intravenous antibiotic "worked" and saved my life. I remember lying with my head off the bed so my lungs could drain into the bucket on the floor - the respiratory folks had given up on me, and I'd been given Last Rites.

The Doctor's insistence on giving me different and stronger doses of antibiotics is what saved my life. However, for the next 7 years, I fought a systemic yeast infection that could have been prevented with a prophilactic course of nystatin, or that strange milk, Acidolphilus (sp?), even yogurt.

I also have a friend who makes me crazy over antibiotics. This person recently had an bad cold on the day of a Doctor's appointment and told me they were going to get something for it. I got on my soapbox about the stupidity of requesting an antibiotic for a damn cold. If they had a sinus infection or earaches, or some ancillary infection, then maybe "yes" on the antibiotics. But not to ask for an antibiotic because they had a cold, for cripes sake.

I've watched this same person get 5 different, and the most recently released, antibiotics, in a year, for whatever they show up in the Doctor's office complaining about.

I don't know who I'm angrier at - the former friend for perpetually requesting the antibiotics, or the dang Doctor for giving them!?! I guess the answer is, both of them.