It wasn’t Pneumonia

Two days into antibiotic treatment my symptoms just weren't going away, and they looked less and less like pneumonia. That was because what I really had was one of a difficult-to-diagnose group of tick-borne diseases (the most well-understood is ehrlichiosis) that need a completely different antibiotic.

We were about to see our regular doctor for follow-up early Friday afternoon when I had a complete physical collapse. I couldn’t stand up. I could take full, deep breaths, but it was as though the air had no oxygen in it. At the emergency room a team began doing many things at once, taking multiple electrocardiograms, many, many, blood samples with many different blood work analyses run simultaneously, while a PA carefully questioned me about what had been going on with symptoms. My heart was in arrhythmia. My pulse was racing at 155 with atrial flutter, meaning the chamber that pumps blood to the lungs was literally fluttering at 310 pulses per minute and not accomplishing much of anything. My blood pressure was effectively zero. So was my white cell count.

They managed to quickly assemble this jigsaw puzzle and found that several of the anomalies in my blood chemistry were consistent with these tick-borne infections; that the tick-borne infections were consistent with the chill/fever symptoms I’d been having; and that these infections are known to set off life-threatening cardiac arrhythmia. The cardiologist on call had arrived and while hitting the infection with a sledgehammer of intravenous antibiotics they wheeled me into another room to go after the heart problem. They used a series of drugs attempting to “convert” the heartbeat back to normal.

I was cautioned that the first drug probably wouldn’t work all by itself, but would serve as a diagnostic for what to do next. That’s what happened. Next they administered something that felt slightly warm for a moment, and then I thought my entire body had melted, liquefied. As the sensation passed the nurse administering the drugs said that one had been a preparation for the next drug they’d try. When that went in, there was just complete quiet for about ninety seconds. The nurse and Tina could see the monitors behind me. Suddenly the nurse’s eyes lit up and he said 145! 135…133…125…113. Just like that. Blood pressure was returning as well. A little while after the pulse had steadied at about 85 the PA came into the room with an-ear-to ear smile and said “You’re converted! Your heart rhythm is normal.”

I spent the weekend in the hospital with a continuous heart monitor and seemingly continuous blood tests along with oceans of intravenous fluids spiked with antibiotic cocktails. Cardiology was testing to see whether the heart was remaining steady and whether it had been damaged. The general MD for my case was testing the effect of their assault on the infection, which is capable of damaging all your organs and killing you outright. Sunday afternoon the cardiologist told me that the blood tests and echocardiogram convinced him my heart function was perfectly normal and cardiology was done with me. A little while later the doctor quarterbacking the case told me my bloodwork was doing fine, the infection sufficiently under control that I could continue my recovery at home with a course of antibiotic (the same one used to treat Lyme disease).

So the next time you pack up your camera gear to go into the woods, fields, meadows, and salt marshes, heed all the warnings, take all the precautions to protect yourself from tick-borne infections. Read about it here and here. Tick-borne diseases are not just some sort of nuisance. They can kill you.