Saturday, January 13, 2007
YIKES
The ice is here and coming on strong. Being in an all electric house is not a good thing sometimes. So I'm off to shower and ready ourselves for plan 2...since I fully expect to lose the juice anytime today or tonight. Stay warm and dry if you can. Winter has just begun.
Wednesday, January 10, 2007
MAKING CHANGES IN LIFE
Lots of people realize they need to make some changes but that is where the progress stops. Throw in a series of new year resolutions, sit back to relax feeling good about having the matter resolved. Yet no progress is made.
MOMS ADVICE ON DEALING WITH IMPORTANT DECISIONS...
"What are you wanting out of life?
What are you getting out of life?
what changes need made to get that result?"
Good common sense facts there. Thats a key part of making the decisions, the next part is...MAKE THOSE CHANGES. I remember telling people in several business meetings (though it wasn't an original idea).."If you keep doing the same old things, the same old way..don't be surprised that you keep getting the same old results".
Now that is usually applied to the fact that "different results are needed", so ya gotta change the ingredients. But its true the other way too, theres a whole lot of times things are just the way ya like them ...be careful not to mess with THOSE ingredients!
No new years resolutions here...those haven't proved helpful. There is a poster on my wall with some really key things I wanted to get done...I looked at it the other day and realized NONE of those have been done...didn't really disturb me TOO much, until i noticed it was dated June 2005. Sheesh, need to change that. So I've been giving thought to what kind of changes I needed to make at work and in my time at home time management to bring that about. Then dividing that up into "baby steps" so I can implement the steps to changes.
Though I don't usually recommend products...this one I've used in the past to help me "get it all together" and it was VERY valuable...so I ordered it and installed it and am using it again..its a journal program that is simple and awesome. You can start using it right away and learn more of its potential as you go. Be sure to make backups (a click of a button) and if you ever have to restore your computer ..zap..your journal of events past present and future are right there.
"Make sure that your daily action list is in line with your true goals and values. All of us have things in life we don't enjoy, but which are important. Life becomes chaotic and crises occur when we don't 'manage' our lives - by taking out the trash, washing our clothes, having regular medical checkups, pay our bills, etc.
But it's time for a major re-evaluation of your life if you find most hours of most days filled with dreaded 'oughts'..."
That quote is one small clip from a really good article titled "Using a Day Planner as a Life Planner" by Kathleen G. Nadeau, Ph.Dan ADD.
Helpful ways to implement "making the changes" in mom's quote at the start of this blog.
Saturday, January 06, 2007
Arava or Leflunomide Respiratory side affects
Unfortunately this particular post is more lengthy and technical in nature and may not be something the average reader is interested in, but I'm "telling our story" in hopes others who may need it, can search and find it....
In the disease Rheumatoid arthritis , certain parts of a person's immune system not only fight against disease, but fight against the person too. The affect is deterioration of bone in joints, up to the point of crippling and deforming, and swelling and inflammation that results in sometimes extreme and/or endless pain.
Drugs like Arava (and its generic, Leflunomide), are used to hinder these parts of the immune system from damaging and destroying...and in thousands and thousands of cases have brought a slowdown or even stop to the deterioration of bone, and relief from the pain. The claim they make is ...
"Arava proved to reduce signs and symptoms including morning stiffness and the number of tender and swollen joints. Patients in the controlled trials experienced significant improvements in physical function, such as gripping, reaching, walking, dressing, and rising from a chair. Feet and hand x-rays of those taking Arava in the trials showed that Arava can also slow down joint damage caused by the disease. "
As usual...there are possible undesirable side affects. With Arava the ones that seem more common include hair thinning/loss, diarrhea, elevated liver enzymes, and rash.
In the first quarter of last year when the doc added ARAVA to Mrs. Bean's regime of medications , the only adverse things experienced were small little spots of rash on many of her joints, and some hair thinning..but she was experiencing relief...there was little to no swelling and pain in the joints.
While the RA doc was mindful to keep a check on Mrs. Bean's blood for possible liver damage...What angers me is that nowhere in the process of starting her on this drug was it mentioned..."hey, there is another rare but potentially DEADLY side affect to this drug that it has a history of to watch out for...so if you start dealing with alot of odd respiratory issues...you need to be on guard and possibly reduce or discontinue this drug immediately"...
As summer began, several months had passed, long enough for us to no longer be connecting cause/effect,...when she developed a hard cough that was difficult to diagnose, all her blood counts and oxygen was fine and lungs on the xrays were clear but yet the cough persisted, violently. Finally after a visit to a pulmonary specialist, it was surmised that it was whooping cough..and that may be, since the times between coughing fits, she was perfectly fine, but when they would come on, they were extremely severe.
The summer and early fall, meant about 100 days of the harsh coughing before it would come to an end, though a nagging cough continued to appear. A few months later bringing us to my last post when, as we were mindful of the coming new year...
...it welcomed us with another onset of severe coughing and very little lung capacity to breathe in air, and based on a chest X-ray in ER she was diagnosed with bronchitis, they saw congestion in the bronchi but not in the lungs, so they sent her on her way with cough suppressant and a 5day zpack of strong antibiotic.
Fortunately 5 days later we went to our regular doctor and he ordered a contrast-enhanced CT scan angio pulmonary, it showed significant bilateral pulmonary infiltrate. She was given a shot of cortisone and the doctor changed her antibiotic medication to avelox and a generic for Bactrim DS...but none of it was making sense, she didn't have the normal symptoms or detection markers of common pneumonia.
That night I spent my night doing an immediate very intense research of all the facts available, and uncovered a common bond that she had with some other people using Arava...I'll share some of those here for the sake of others, because though this reaction to Arava does seem to be very rare...for those few, correctly identifying the source of the problem could make the difference between life and death. Information we were unaware of...
An excerpt from around 2002 in a carefully documented study published in Brazil in a Journal of Pulmonology....
"...We report the case of a 33-year-old female patient who presented with chest pain, weight loss and pulmonary infectious syndrome during the fifth month of monotherapy with leflunomide for rheumatoid arthritis, which advanced to respiratory insufficiency in the sixth month. Radiologic findings revealed pulmonary infiltrates in the interstice, as well as bilateral alveolar infiltrates (mainly in the upper and middle lobes) and scattered micronodules. However, no mediastinal abnormalities were detected. Leflunomide was suspended... After four months, the condition spontaneously and completely resolved, suggesting that the pulmonary complications seen in this case resulted from the use of leflunomide. "
Another reference , this time from Japan, in January 2004 ,in a report citing an Associated Press article in Tokyo had these excerpts....
"...Sixteen people developed interstitial pneumonia, a debilitating lung condition, after taking the drug. Five of them, aged between 57 and 71, subsequently died, Mr. Kikuchi said.....Overseas, the drug has been administered to some 400,000 people and 80 people had developed interstitial pneumonia..."
An Australian government site reporting back in 2000....
"To date, ADRAC has received 669 reports associated with the use of leflunomide, of which 142 reports involved respiratory symptoms. Twenty two reports describe one or more of the following serious reactions: pneumonitis (8), interstitial lung disease (9), lung infiltration (4), or pulmonary fibrosis (3). Although these 22 reports have used different medical terms, it is likely they have all reported the same condition, commonly called interstitial lung disease (ILD).
Among the 22 reports of ILD .... Four patients died. "
There are many other studies and references but this is enough to at least make someone aware of it. It appears Mrs. Beans happened to be one of those rare few..and has discontinued the Arava, and is continuing treatment. ..so we're hopeful this year won't be heavy laden with respiratory problems like last year was.
In the disease Rheumatoid arthritis , certain parts of a person's immune system not only fight against disease, but fight against the person too. The affect is deterioration of bone in joints, up to the point of crippling and deforming, and swelling and inflammation that results in sometimes extreme and/or endless pain.
Drugs like Arava (and its generic, Leflunomide), are used to hinder these parts of the immune system from damaging and destroying...and in thousands and thousands of cases have brought a slowdown or even stop to the deterioration of bone, and relief from the pain. The claim they make is ...
"Arava proved to reduce signs and symptoms including morning stiffness and the number of tender and swollen joints. Patients in the controlled trials experienced significant improvements in physical function, such as gripping, reaching, walking, dressing, and rising from a chair. Feet and hand x-rays of those taking Arava in the trials showed that Arava can also slow down joint damage caused by the disease. "
As usual...there are possible undesirable side affects. With Arava the ones that seem more common include hair thinning/loss, diarrhea, elevated liver enzymes, and rash.
In the first quarter of last year when the doc added ARAVA to Mrs. Bean's regime of medications , the only adverse things experienced were small little spots of rash on many of her joints, and some hair thinning..but she was experiencing relief...there was little to no swelling and pain in the joints.
While the RA doc was mindful to keep a check on Mrs. Bean's blood for possible liver damage...What angers me is that nowhere in the process of starting her on this drug was it mentioned..."hey, there is another rare but potentially DEADLY side affect to this drug that it has a history of to watch out for...so if you start dealing with alot of odd respiratory issues...you need to be on guard and possibly reduce or discontinue this drug immediately"...
As summer began, several months had passed, long enough for us to no longer be connecting cause/effect,...when she developed a hard cough that was difficult to diagnose, all her blood counts and oxygen was fine and lungs on the xrays were clear but yet the cough persisted, violently. Finally after a visit to a pulmonary specialist, it was surmised that it was whooping cough..and that may be, since the times between coughing fits, she was perfectly fine, but when they would come on, they were extremely severe.
The summer and early fall, meant about 100 days of the harsh coughing before it would come to an end, though a nagging cough continued to appear. A few months later bringing us to my last post when, as we were mindful of the coming new year...
...it welcomed us with another onset of severe coughing and very little lung capacity to breathe in air, and based on a chest X-ray in ER she was diagnosed with bronchitis, they saw congestion in the bronchi but not in the lungs, so they sent her on her way with cough suppressant and a 5day zpack of strong antibiotic.
Fortunately 5 days later we went to our regular doctor and he ordered a contrast-enhanced CT scan angio pulmonary, it showed significant bilateral pulmonary infiltrate. She was given a shot of cortisone and the doctor changed her antibiotic medication to avelox and a generic for Bactrim DS...but none of it was making sense, she didn't have the normal symptoms or detection markers of common pneumonia.
That night I spent my night doing an immediate very intense research of all the facts available, and uncovered a common bond that she had with some other people using Arava...I'll share some of those here for the sake of others, because though this reaction to Arava does seem to be very rare...for those few, correctly identifying the source of the problem could make the difference between life and death. Information we were unaware of...
An excerpt from around 2002 in a carefully documented study published in Brazil in a Journal of Pulmonology....
"...We report the case of a 33-year-old female patient who presented with chest pain, weight loss and pulmonary infectious syndrome during the fifth month of monotherapy with leflunomide for rheumatoid arthritis, which advanced to respiratory insufficiency in the sixth month. Radiologic findings revealed pulmonary infiltrates in the interstice, as well as bilateral alveolar infiltrates (mainly in the upper and middle lobes) and scattered micronodules. However, no mediastinal abnormalities were detected. Leflunomide was suspended... After four months, the condition spontaneously and completely resolved, suggesting that the pulmonary complications seen in this case resulted from the use of leflunomide. "
Another reference , this time from Japan, in January 2004 ,in a report citing an Associated Press article in Tokyo had these excerpts....
"...Sixteen people developed interstitial pneumonia, a debilitating lung condition, after taking the drug. Five of them, aged between 57 and 71, subsequently died, Mr. Kikuchi said.....Overseas, the drug has been administered to some 400,000 people and 80 people had developed interstitial pneumonia..."
An Australian government site reporting back in 2000....
"To date, ADRAC has received 669 reports associated with the use of leflunomide, of which 142 reports involved respiratory symptoms. Twenty two reports describe one or more of the following serious reactions: pneumonitis (8), interstitial lung disease (9), lung infiltration (4), or pulmonary fibrosis (3). Although these 22 reports have used different medical terms, it is likely they have all reported the same condition, commonly called interstitial lung disease (ILD).
Among the 22 reports of ILD .... Four patients died. "
There are many other studies and references but this is enough to at least make someone aware of it. It appears Mrs. Beans happened to be one of those rare few..and has discontinued the Arava, and is continuing treatment. ..so we're hopeful this year won't be heavy laden with respiratory problems like last year was.
Time for some Cartoons?
The lady at the insurance office replied to the customary "how ya doing?" with "It's Friday", with all the excitement of a kid in school Friday afternoon just a few more minutes till the bell.
Pretending to share in the enthusiasm was easy, since many many times that joyful "freedom" has been felt thru life...Such a good performance that its doubtful she had the slightest inkling that she was the only one there really excited .
That was the plan anyway, it just seems like people who actually only have a momentary business only relationship or knowledge of each other, owe it to each other to "keep that chin up", "show some white when ya smile", "leave 'em feeling even zippier than ya found them"...and maybe thats all she was actually doing too? Most of the time these days it just isn't really difficult being of good cheer, and sparkly energy...Today started out that way, but by afternoon things had changed.
Mrs Beans this past weekend, (wow, has a whole week passed!), had developed a very severe cough, and seemed to have precious little capacity to breathe. ER took a chest X-ray and easily diagnosed those air hoses going into the lungs were clogging up, bronchitis, they saw congestion in the bronchi but the X-ray had good news...if she could get those hoses cleaned up the lungs were clear... so they sent her on her way with cough suppressant and a 6day zpack of strong antibiotic.
By the time Fantastic Friday arrived she should've been chirping like a bird and grinnin like that insurance woman...but there was very little change, and that had to be a disappointing way to start the year. Almost a whole week, (the first week of a new year)...breathing very shallow, keeping very still, or and yet..inevitably,...coughing so hard it hurts all over. Some say that acute bronchitis generally lasts 7-10 days though so there was a glimmer of hope there to explain away the lack of improvement cause it was probably just gonna come all at once the last few days of that stretch.
The doctor seemed confused about the lack of progress, all those little readings they could take like blood pressure and temperature and what not was fine enough, so whats the holdup? Being the cautious man he's always been, he sends her over for one of those CT angio pulmonary things they call a Cat scan...but since they stick a needle in the arm and inject saline, then in a bit...some kind of dye...its probably not the way a person would really be planning to spend ..."a Friday". Yet once that was done...Yihaw! (Well, the exciting thought really centered more on getting back under the covers in that comfortable bed, where breathing shallow isn't too hard on a body).
About the time the covers were pulled and the car was cooling off, that doctor was on the phone personally..."good news is, didn't see any embolism"...(Now even if ya didn't know what an embolism was, it would still just SEEM like good news that there wasn't one crawling around inside). ..but the bad news is...it isn't just the hoses that were clogged, both the lungs were especially "infiltrated"..."bilateral pulmonary infiltrate". Its one thing to try to vacuum with a clogged hose, but when the bag is full, its a whole lot of work and not much cleaning. So even if the Bronchitis was completely cleared up (which it wasn't)...there wasn't much place for that air to go. As the good Doctor talked he seemed to kind of mumble off, not only did it just not make any sense...at this point things are getting a bit spooky.
So its just not easy to go in there and tell your very best friend in life that not only is it unlikely the next few days will be the high speed end of feeling good, better, best...but instead, things aren't going to be letting up much, and it could be a hard journey these next coming days. She took it all pretty good, or she put on a good performance, cause as she turned to sleep...all the final errands of the day were just beginning...(including the stop at the insurance office)
...It just didn't make any sense. All indicators pointed the other way...there wasn't anything environmental or burdensome these past 5 days...so why were things turning the wrong way? Thats not how its supposed to work. Thats when that little bottle of pills the Rheumatoid doctor had her on since spring came back to mind and that phone was working in reverse, soon that doctor was agreeing, it might be a good idea to stop those daily doses of Arava (Leflunomide) at least for now.
So there might have been several hours of errands to run, but there wasn't any doubt that there was going to be some heavy duty researching done when this Friday slowed down.
You'll have to wait till next blog to find out what all that turned up, if anything...so till then "keep that chin up", "show some white when ya smile", "leave 'em feeling even zippier than ya found them"...(and take a long slow deep breath and let it out even slower...cause even that is something ya just can't know how good it is till ya lose it). And if you remember right, there was something better than a Friday afternoon school bell...it was those Saturday mornings!
Pretending to share in the enthusiasm was easy, since many many times that joyful "freedom" has been felt thru life...Such a good performance that its doubtful she had the slightest inkling that she was the only one there really excited .
That was the plan anyway, it just seems like people who actually only have a momentary business only relationship or knowledge of each other, owe it to each other to "keep that chin up", "show some white when ya smile", "leave 'em feeling even zippier than ya found them"...and maybe thats all she was actually doing too? Most of the time these days it just isn't really difficult being of good cheer, and sparkly energy...Today started out that way, but by afternoon things had changed.
Mrs Beans this past weekend, (wow, has a whole week passed!), had developed a very severe cough, and seemed to have precious little capacity to breathe. ER took a chest X-ray and easily diagnosed those air hoses going into the lungs were clogging up, bronchitis, they saw congestion in the bronchi but the X-ray had good news...if she could get those hoses cleaned up the lungs were clear... so they sent her on her way with cough suppressant and a 6day zpack of strong antibiotic.
By the time Fantastic Friday arrived she should've been chirping like a bird and grinnin like that insurance woman...but there was very little change, and that had to be a disappointing way to start the year. Almost a whole week, (the first week of a new year)...breathing very shallow, keeping very still, or and yet..inevitably,...coughing so hard it hurts all over. Some say that acute bronchitis generally lasts 7-10 days though so there was a glimmer of hope there to explain away the lack of improvement cause it was probably just gonna come all at once the last few days of that stretch.
The doctor seemed confused about the lack of progress, all those little readings they could take like blood pressure and temperature and what not was fine enough, so whats the holdup? Being the cautious man he's always been, he sends her over for one of those CT angio pulmonary things they call a Cat scan...but since they stick a needle in the arm and inject saline, then in a bit...some kind of dye...its probably not the way a person would really be planning to spend ..."a Friday". Yet once that was done...Yihaw! (Well, the exciting thought really centered more on getting back under the covers in that comfortable bed, where breathing shallow isn't too hard on a body).
About the time the covers were pulled and the car was cooling off, that doctor was on the phone personally..."good news is, didn't see any embolism"...(Now even if ya didn't know what an embolism was, it would still just SEEM like good news that there wasn't one crawling around inside). ..but the bad news is...it isn't just the hoses that were clogged, both the lungs were especially "infiltrated"..."bilateral pulmonary infiltrate". Its one thing to try to vacuum with a clogged hose, but when the bag is full, its a whole lot of work and not much cleaning. So even if the Bronchitis was completely cleared up (which it wasn't)...there wasn't much place for that air to go. As the good Doctor talked he seemed to kind of mumble off, not only did it just not make any sense...at this point things are getting a bit spooky.
So its just not easy to go in there and tell your very best friend in life that not only is it unlikely the next few days will be the high speed end of feeling good, better, best...but instead, things aren't going to be letting up much, and it could be a hard journey these next coming days. She took it all pretty good, or she put on a good performance, cause as she turned to sleep...all the final errands of the day were just beginning...(including the stop at the insurance office)
...It just didn't make any sense. All indicators pointed the other way...there wasn't anything environmental or burdensome these past 5 days...so why were things turning the wrong way? Thats not how its supposed to work. Thats when that little bottle of pills the Rheumatoid doctor had her on since spring came back to mind and that phone was working in reverse, soon that doctor was agreeing, it might be a good idea to stop those daily doses of Arava (Leflunomide) at least for now.
So there might have been several hours of errands to run, but there wasn't any doubt that there was going to be some heavy duty researching done when this Friday slowed down.
You'll have to wait till next blog to find out what all that turned up, if anything...so till then "keep that chin up", "show some white when ya smile", "leave 'em feeling even zippier than ya found them"...(and take a long slow deep breath and let it out even slower...cause even that is something ya just can't know how good it is till ya lose it). And if you remember right, there was something better than a Friday afternoon school bell...it was those Saturday mornings!
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