If you suffer from chronic and recurring infections, your health complications may be associated with a disorder known as a primary immunodeficiency. This may be the complication, especially if you have been considered a “sickly” type of person since you were a child. In many adults, especially those in their 20s and 30s, as you ...
Most people do not know of my CVID illness. I developed a lazy habit of simply attributing most health nuisances to Lyme disease – to avoid the glazed, puzzled, or bored look in people’s eyes. Apparently in our post-AIDS world, the phrase “immune deficiency” is the problem. Whether it instills mild terror or the word ...
Diagnosed with Common Variable Immune Deficiency (CVID) in 1994, I soon became a patient advocate for this frequently misunderstood and undiagnosed illness. Oddly enough, the organization I first worked with was U.K. based, and I happen to be a U.S. resident. My U.K. contacts were more experienced with CVID than their U.S. counterparts, and U.S. ...
Brooke’s friends often reminded her of how lucky she was. The 17-year-old high school junior had a body made for running. Her high school coach told her it wasn’t a question of if she would get a college scholarship but of how much she would be awarded. Neither of them had any idea that within ...
I was diagnosed with ITP after going into the doctor for back pain after a recent gall bladder surgery. Since he and I both thought that was the cause of the pain, we were both mystified at the pain since there was no apparent cause since we both believed the back pain was from my ...
I have a love/hate relationship with IVIG. I love that it has kept me out of the hospital, preserved my muscles that allow me to breathe, and those that I use to swallow. I hate that it takes six hours to infuse every two weeks and that it doesn’t always work consistently to manage my ...
“Well,” the ER doctor said, “your platelet levels are falling fast. Yesterday they were 11, this morning they were 4, and now they are 2. Something needs to be done right now.” “What does that mean? I don’t know what all those numbers mean,” I whimpered, “and why do I have all these bruises and ...
My mother-in-law, Alma, has been living with the autoimmune disease known as myasthenia gravis for seven years now. It is a serious and incurable condition characterized primarily by muscle weakness and fatigue. I have known her for 17 years and she is one of the most positive and happy people I have ever met. Even ...
Karla News
Karla News