Well, we have been through quite the ordeal lately and this is going to be quite a long post! A little background:
Eleanor has had an ear infection (since October 25th) that has not cleared. She was first prescribed Amoxicillin and after 7 days was still complaining of an ear ache. We took her back to the doctor and was given cephzil (sp?). She finished this 10 day course of antibiotics. After being off the antibiotics for 1 day she again complained that her ear hurt. So back to the doctor we went to have ears rechecked. This time she was prescribed Biaxin and referred to an ENT for an ear tube consult (another post). This was all on Thursday afternoon. Thursday night when I went to get the new antibiotic Eleanor started throwing up with a totally unrelated 12-24 stomach bug. She had one dose of the Biaxin and threw it back up and didn't have anymore because the next morning she still didn't feel 100%. Friday afternoon she broke out in a rash. We made to Redicare too late be seen by a doctor but a nurse was kind enough to unlock the door and look at Eleanor. She said to give her some Bendryl and come back in the morning if it was worse.
Saturday morning: It was worse! She woke up with the rash covering even more of her body and had a temperature of 103.5. Redicare sent her to the ER. Andrew and Eleanor stayed all day at the ER where she was given a steroid shot and a shot of antibiotics, as well as a saline IV to get her temperature down. (The doctor did not impress us, but that is also another story...) He sent us home telling Andrew it was probably an allergic reaction to Biaxin (only had one dose and threw it up almost immediately). Eleanor was to return to the ER for a recheck in the morning. These were taken after arriving home Saturday night.
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| This is Eleanor's camera smile. |
The rash is looking much better in these pictures than before they left. The middle parts where it is a little whiteish looking were a bit blistered, but had really gone down since the morning.
Sunday morning she looked much better and we took some more pictures after a bath with Marshall.
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| The "blister" looking thing in the top right is a water drop. |
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| Still looks bad, but much better than before. The rash was pretty flat and seemed to be really reduced. |
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| The rash on the top part of her back looked bruised and we took pictures of this in case things went down hill again. |
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| Bruised rash on her arm. | |
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Mommy took Eleanor to the ER for her recheck on Sunday. The (insert sarcastic voice here) lovely doctor that saw Eleanor on Saturday saw us again on Sunday. He attitude was improved, but he said she was fine. She had some "insect bite" looking parts to the rash on her leg, which is what we first noticed when the rash started on Friday afternoon and I showed them to the doctor, but he dismissed them, saying she was fine, but if we were really concerned to call our regular doctor on Monday. The rest of the day she acted fine and the rash seemed to not be growing.
Monday Morning: RASH IS WORSE! When I went in to get Eleanor up I noticed that the rash had spread again and also she was having trouble opening one eye! After turning on the lights it was very obvious that she was NOT better! Her face was swollen and the rash was completely covering her back. The fever (which she had not had on Sunday) had returned. Andrew immediately took her to the ER and Mommy joined them later after Marshall had woken up and been dropped at MarMar's.
While at the ER Eleanor got more Benadryl and another steroid shot. Andrew also asked to see a different doctor than we had previously seen and wanted them to get us in to see Dr. Schell (our regular pediatrician) as soon as possible.
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| The places that aren't covered had previously been covered. Pretty much everywhere looked like this. |
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| You can see that her face is swollen. This is shortly after having the shots. It was much worse when she left the house. |
After examining her Dr. Schell told us that the rash is mostly likely an allergic reaction to the Cephzil. Even though she had had it before he explained that sometimes on the xth time you are exposed to something that's when you react. He has put us on a course of Benadryl. We are giving it to her several times a day at the moment and are going to slowly ween her down from it. She looks
way better now. There are still a couple of marks on her face from the swelling and she has a couple of new rash spots, but Dr. Schell said this was normal and it might take 2-3 weeks for all traces to disappear. We are happy to report she is feeling much, much better and things are going much better!
