POZ Community Forums
Meds, Mind, Body & Benefits => Questions About Treatment & Side Effects => Topic started by: celt74 on October 08, 2012, 04:44:05 pm
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Can someone help me. I started atripla a week ago and the side effect it has given me is extreme dizziness to the point where I can staqnd on my feet too long. Two days ago my skin started burning, Now i have very red angry skin over about 95% of my body and is unbearable to touch. Then that night i started to fever and my temperature can shoot to 104. I have a very sore back now too i haven't slept properly forthree days and feel so low I think If i have to stay on this I will not have any quality of life. My ears also hurt and I am swollen around my eyes. I've tried calling my consultant but I can#t get through.
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Most of the time patients ride out a rash, but in something like 25% of these rash cases it's severe enough that they must switch medications. I'm concerned that yours is so severe that you have a temperature of 104. How long has the temperature been that high? I'd be tempted to go to an emergency room seeing as how you can't get through to your doctor.
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I'm with P, you should go to an ER...like now.
-W
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I'm with Miss P and Wump, get to the doctor now!
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ditto, NOW!
please follow up with all of us so we know how you are doing.
mitch
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Celt, I hope you're ok. You should have gone to A&E as soon as you got a high fever with the rash. This is a symptom of Stevens–Johnson syndrome (SJS) and can be quite serious. Only a very small percentage of people get this reaction - it's usually from the Sustiva component of Atripla.
Doctors should be telling people that while most of the time the rash is harmless and goes away after a few days, if it is accompanied by a high fever (and often dizziness and nausea) then it's imperative to get to an emergency medical facility as soon as humanly possible.
I hope we hear back from you soon.
Welcome to the forums, by the way.
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Thank you all so much for your help, I'm feeling very tired emotional and you've really helped with your kind words. I got through to another doc as my own consultant is sick so that explains the silence of yesterday. After I described the very long list of symptoms to him, then sent him a pic of my very purple burn marked chest, I have to come off Atripla immediately it seems, i'm one of those rare cases that is likely to have an issue with sustiva. I don't know how that bodes for the future... but I will worry about that later. He's sent through a paper for steroid cream and told me to flush out my body for 48 hours with a few instructions on how to do that effectively. I'm going into the clinic tomorrow morning when I won't maybe look so frightening to small children with red and purple marks on my neck and ears. I've got to flush out the atripla before I can start the replacement. I'm normally I very physically active person so this has been a huge shock to be so physically incapacitated by a drug. I can't thank you all enough.
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And I should say, as it is the responsible thing to do... that it's never recommended to just come off a prescribed course with a few symptoms but a fever with a rash is a justifiable warning that the drug isn't for you. This one hasn't agreed with me and my body but it doesn't mean it isn't going to work just fine for you.
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now is not the time to be worried about kids at the clinic.
if i were you, i wouldn't wait but perhaps the doctor you spoke to relayed more information?
there are many other meds available to you, so don't get too discouraged!
hope you feel better fast.
mitch
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Celt...
Just a gentle reminder that you have other (meds) options so try not to get too down over this nasty bump in the road. Please keep us posted as to your course of action.
Drew