Living with Tuberculosis

In Dec. 07 I began to have pain in my left chest when I took a deep breath. Having had a previous collapsed lung, I went to my doctor fearing this was happening again. After taking a chest x-ray, he confirmed I did NOT have a collapsed lung; however, I had shadowing in my lung that was not acceptable. He questioned me about TB and whether I had ever had TB. Although I had an exposure to TB approx. 4 years earlier, I told him the skin test was negative. He did another skin test which again was negative. He then treated me with antiobiotics for pneumonia This relieved the pain when breathing but the 2nd chest x-ray was no better. He then ordered a CAT scan. The results of the CAT scan showed a cavity in the lung and he referred me to a pulmonary specialist.

The pulmonary doctor scheduled a broncoscopy and that revealed the TB. However, I would like to point out that I did not have any real symptoms prior to the broncoscopy. No more pain breathing, no fever, night sweats etc. Due to the Christmas holidays, it was approx. 30 days from the initial doctor visit to the date of the broncoscopy. It seems that immediately after the broncoscopy, I began to have a fever I could not break, a cough I could not get rid of, loss of apetite and weight loss. One week later, I was admitted to the hospital and placed in isolation!

While in the hospital, I began to have the night sweats for the first few days. I spent 2 weeks in the hosptial in isolation, one week on home quarrantine, and one more week at home unrestricted before being allowed to go back to work. I am currently on 3 meds and am 3 months into the 9 month treatment. I am unable to take the Isoniazid as I developed hepatitis from it. I am a rather healthy 48 yr old female with none of the risk factors for TB and I still wonder each day why and how I got this disease. I might also mention that I have now had 3 skin tests, all of which have been negative even though I have active TB disease??

I would caution anyone with TB type symptoms to watch carefully. If my primary care doctor had just said “watch and see” after the antibiotics helped to some degree, I might have gone undetected for quite a while. I can’t thank him enough for following up with the CAT scan and referral. It was the abnormal chest x-ray that he did not like. In fact, he said to me “clinically you feel better, but I just do not like what I see on the x-ray” Therefore, he went further to see what was up. Hopefully, after I complete the 9 months of drug therapy, I will be cured with a very little chance of getting this again. However, the drug therapy itself is very hard on me. I have achy joints from the meds, a bloated feeling each time I take the meds (there are soooo many pills) and a bit of lethargy or tiredness I cant shake. This is a tough disease to get and I think too many people think like I used to- that TB was basically abolished in the US. Not True, as I have found out.