Back on the Big Drugs

Well, it was inevitable that at some point I was going to end up back on the strong IV drugs, but I had been hoping to last longer than three and a half months.  Once again it's back to the good old rather too tried and tested Colomycin and Ceftazadime three times a day for at least two weeks. I make no apology for mis-spelling any of the drug names in this post as to be honest they all seem to be deliberately complicated!  Being back on IV's is very annoying and dull, but it has to be done as the oral Ciprofloxacilin was just not working and I've been in a lot of pain from my damn lungs not to mention coughing up gunk that resmbles toxic waste-nice! 

One slightly worrying thing is the rather large number of drugs that I can't take intra-veinously as I am allergic to them. I can't take Astreonam or Fossfomycin cos they make me projectile vomit, Meropenum affects my white blood count, Tobramycin IV affects my hearing and balance, etc etc etc.... I'm really down to these two I am on now plus Tazocin, if I want to do the drugs at home.  If I were to try Imipenum then I would probably have to be admitted as it can make you very sick and they like to monitor you whilst you are on it.  Now I am not the kind of person who likes being admitted for 2 weeks, to be honest I don't like have to spend the best part of a day at Papwroth just for a checkup... so I am not keen on this option. Another option is to get a port fitted (ie permanent access) which would mean I might tolerate some of the drugs better, particularly the Cipro as the main problem I have with that is that it inflames my veins and then they stop working. Although I am not keen on having a permanent reminder of my CF and I don't really have IV's enough to justify it yet.  However, by having a port the drug would be injected into a much bigger vessel so get diluted much more quickly and hopefully not irritate my veins.  In fact, this did work quite well when I had  PICC line (peripherally inserted central cannula-I think!) which like a port goes in a much bigger vessel but is only temporary like a line.  Thing is the only time I had one of those it sodding hurt to have it inserted so this is not a pleasing idea either!  In any case, I am just hoping that some clever doctor comes up with a new wonder drug that has no side effects and makes me feel loads better really quickly... fingers crossed I suppose!