Skin Staph Infection After Mastectomy??

3girls4me

Hi all,

I'm a bit in panic mode.  I had bilateral w/expanders 9 days ago.  All went well, but  4 days home from hospital I had this wierd pimple blister thing on my leg.  Then noticed one on arm.  PS said to go to regular dr. if it didn't go away or got worse.   So today, I have about 5 total of these things, not going away, I went to regular doctor.  She said I have a skin staph infection!   I was already taking keflex (for drains), she switched me to Clindamycin for 10 days.  OK, I FREAKED at the word staph infection (horror stories on TV!).  I just worry about my incisions and causing complications with expanders, etc.

I'm just wondering if anyone else has had this, or any experience.  I know staph is fairly common and is everywhere.  But it's not fun after just having had surgery!!!!

Thanks in advance

Leslie

TenderIsOurMight

Hi Leslie,



So sorry to hear this, and yes, you are legitimately concerned. Regrettably, Staph,,aka. Staphlococcus, is present in the community, but even more so in hospitals.



Did you Doctor take a culture of your skin blisters by any chance? I know you said you were on Keflex, so perhaps she did not.



Clindamycin is usually pretty active against Staph, yet at times Staph can be resistant to it too, so you and your doctor will work closely together, yes?



You definitely want to report, even this weekend, if after 24 to 48 hours on the Clindamycin there is no improvement of the skin lesions and please call sooner if this worsens. It's important to make sure the right antibiotic is found to correctly treat your Staph. Do you have a followup appointment with her for next week?



Hopefully this won't involve your breast reconstruction. Nothing you can do other than just keep an eye on the incision for redness and change in appearance, and on the chest wall for redness.



At home, extra hand washing by family members, not sharing hand towels (maybe a paper towel weekend), and separating your clothes to be washed on hot just for a few days may be good to allow the antibiotic to take effect.



One last point: your doctor should report this to the hospital you had your surgery at so a infection control case manager can start working on a report, including talking to you.



Again, I'm sorry you have this problem. I had several surgeries myself and always was concerned about acquiring an infection. Hopefully the Clindamycin covers your particular strain of Staph, will kick in soon and you'll be just fine.



Keep us posted.

Tender

Edit: Why not consider adding some yogurt with Acidophilus cultures in it or go buy a Probiotic and take a small amount each day? This helps maintain the good intestinal bacteria while the Clindamycin does it's job. A good four weeks of this would be super. T

Jellydonut

Hi Leslie,

 I'm so sorry this has happened to you.  Although I did not get a staph infection with any of my surgeries, I did get an infected pimple on my face (what a sight that was) and did take antibiotics and used a topical cream.  Both were successful. I still don't know how that happened.  When I did some research, I learned that we all have staph in our own bodies!  What a shock.

A few suggestions for anyone undergoing surgery; I've had eight surgeries thus far in my life and here's what I've learned:

Take as many disposable items to the hospital as possible and upon departure, leave them in their trash can.

Use the hospital slippers, then leave them in the trash.

Use the hospital gowns, etc.  Most of us as women (me included) like to have the nice robe, slippers, nightgowns for the hospital, but upon coming home, the hospital germs are arriving home with you.

Immediately when getting home, I wipe my cell phone with alcohol and any other items in my handbag (pen, mirror, etc.)  I also wipe the entire handbag and overnight bag with antibacterial wipes and then antibacterial spray.  Oh, and my shoes too!

The clothes I wore home go immediately into the laundry.

Of course none of the above provides a guarentee that you won't get an infection, but it's a few extra steps of precaution.

I hope you get well real soon.

Hugs,

Dee

Shirlann

This is a hospital borne germ.  Get on it quick.  Some of them are resistant to various antibiotics, with Vancomycin one of the few left that usually work.

So don't let this go.

Hugs, Shirlann

TenderIsOurMight

Leslie,



Wondering how your skin infection is clearing up? Hope all is well.



Tender

3girls4me

Hi Tender,

Thank you for checking on me!   I finished the antibiotics yesterday morning, and all the blisters (about 5) are all flat and dried up.  So hopefully that means it is gone and not coming back!

Thanks for your tip about the yogurt....I have been eating it daily and taking acidophilus.   I have some mild diarrhea from the AB's (sorry...too much information?), hopefully it goes away soon.   I have heard horror stories, including my mother in law, who got the C.Diff from antibiotics and landed herself in the hospital for a week, it's very dangerous.

Reconstruction going well, had first fill. And going to PS tomorrow, for probably another one.

Leslie

jsims2

Leslie,

Not to scare you , but all through Chemo I kept Staph.  I would get anywhere from 3 -15 blisters with each treatment and the Oncologist said it was common.  I am done with my treatments and all of the Staph is also gone.  Your body just gets so weak it just effects everyone differently.  Good luck and hugs...

cheekymonkey

Hi Leslie-

I just went through the same thing. I had a mastectomy and a lat flap reconstruction. My PS used a tissue expander. It was very painful, and I'm highly resistant to pain meds, so instead of asking for more pain meds, I used a heating pad. I ended up with what we thought was a burn, but a couple of weeks later, my breast was still swollen and really sore. I thought that would have gone away in the first three weeks. So I went back to my PS and he looked at my reconstructed breast and felt how hot it was, and knew that I had an infection. He drained some fluid and let it grow in the lab, and sure enough it was staph. I was called the day they found out, and they scheduled surgery for me the next day. I had to go in and he cleaned out a ton of fluid, removed my tissue expander (thank God because that really hurt!) and put in an implant. I stayed in the hospital for one more day, and then begged to get out so I could go to work to pay all of my hospital bills! I was put on Home care with a Home Health Nurse, and I also had to give myself two weeks of vancomycin IV, twice a day for an hour and a half each time. After two weeks, it seemed much better, but he put me on Bactrim for another two weeks. I had NO idea that I was allergic to Bactrim, but I took one pill and BLEW UP! I had to go to the ER and get a shot of Benedryl. My skin looked like I had been burned! I just took valium for four days and slept through it because nothing could help me out of my misery.

Two weeks later, I go to see my PS. I was scheduled to do the other side reconstruction. I was nervous because in my mind, I was still being treated for the staph when it was interrupted because of the allergic reaction. I asked him what we were going to do, and he said I do not have staph anymore. I asked him why I was still having these pimple like things on my arms, and he said it was from the allergy. I asked him why my lungs were not working as good as they used to , and he said it was from my allergy. Basically everything was because of the allergy I had. He said "You CANNOT have two things wrong with you at the same time! So the Staph is gone and everything else is due to the allergies". When I questioned that statement, he got SO angry. He was going to put me on three weeks of Prednisone (steroids), but I refused to take them for that long. I told him that I wanted to see the Dermatologist who recommended this, and when I did, he said he would not put me on ANY steroids. I also asked my PS if I had to continue taking meds for the staph, and he was so angry and said again that it was gone. I said, then why was I taking Bactrim if I didn't need it and the infection was gone? And he said, "Because that is the standard procedure". I wanted to tell him that HE was one of the causes for the MRSA "Superbug" Staph that is killing so many people. Giving out unneccessary drugs/antibiotics.

So now I sit here, I have no idea if my staph is really gone. ***ARE there ANY tests for this????? I'm still very itchy, but no one will help me with that, either. And the worst part is that I'm stuck with one halfway done breast and a Plastic Surgeon that is SO mad at me that I don't think he wants to work with me anymore (and I don't know that I want to work with him either!)

As if this whole thing isn't hard enough!!!!

Thanks for letting me vent!

mitzi 

I know this is long, but I guess my point is, stand up for yourself, question your doctors to make sure you stay healthy, even if it means losing them. I'm afraid if I had some staph leftover, and then took three weeks of steroids, I would have ended up really, really sick.

It's been a nightmare and I'm glad you are back on track!!!

mitzi 

3girls4me

Oh wow Mitzi!!!!

Thanks for sharing your ordeal with me, that is really unbelievable!  Not only that you got it, but how you were treated!

How long has it been since your staph infection?   I guess mine is gone, I just had about 5 blisters, they are flat now, but there is still a pink mark from them, but not like before.   I was put on clindamycin for them, which I knew there could be reprocussions from taking that (like diarrhea), even up to several weeks after treatment!   Then, guess what, about 10 days ago (2 weeks after stopping the clindamycin), I was having bad diarrhea, went to ER on Saturday night, and they took a sample and today they called me with results, I have a C. Diff infection from taking the antibiotics!   GREAT!  One thing causes another!  So now I have to take another kind of antibiotic for 2 weeks.   I guess c. diff is an overgrowth of the bad bacteria which the good bacteria snuffs out, but when you take a lot of antibiotics, they kill all the bacteria good and bad.   

In the meantime, I have not gotten any fills for 3 weeks because  I had to have a couple more stitches put in.  Hopefully on Friday I'll get another fill and get the ball moving again!   These setbacks really are frustrating!

My heart goes out to you......what an ordeal!  Like we don't have enough to deal with!

Leslie

watergirl

Leslie,

I took Clindamycin for a tooth infection last Feb and fought a C.Diff infection for 4 months after that.  It would clear up then return a week or so after finishing the antibiotics.  After the third time (and three antibiotics that failed) what finally worked was taking 1500 mg of Saccharomyces boulardii each day.  Saccharmoyces boulardii  has been shown to smother out the C.diff.  It is common treatment in Europe for C. diff infections. Make sure you purchase it cold and keep it cold otherwise it won't work. The diarrehea from the C.diff was as miserable to have as any of the symptoms from AC.  The 1500 mg (its alot!) cleared up my symptoms in 2 days, just like the antibiotics.  I kept taking it for at the high dose for 2 weeks then slowly took it down to zero after about 2 months.  I've not had a problem in 4 month!!  I hope the infection doesn't return, but if it does please consider the S. boulardii.  It will kill the C.diff while also repopulating your flora and fauna.  If you take it now with the antibiotic (it won't hurt anything) you can probably get a way with a half to a third of the does, but I suggest you take it for at least a month.

mthomp2020

Watergirl, that's interesting about C.Diff infection.  I had a root canal gone bad, and had an infection flair up 3 times and was on antibiotics for it.  The first time I also had a slight skin infection at my port scar, and this was right before my mastectomy surgery, so I did the antibiotic for the tooth first, then had to do Keflex.  I did end up with diarreah, which I finally figured out was due to the good bacteria being killed off.  I got some yogurt, and it did clear up.  My onc. never suggested using an antibiotic for the diarrehea. 

I'm getting a little again from the last course of antibiotics, which was 2-3 weeks ago, when I had the tooth pulled.  I'll look into using the S. Boulardii, since that's much better then using antibiotics.  Until my tooth problem, I hadn't had to use antibiotics for anything in almost 10 years.  Ironically it was for an infection around the same tooth, before I had the root canal!  Maybe I should have gotten rid of it then!

3girls4me

Thank you guys for sharing your stories!   Water girl, I'll definitely check into the S. boulardi.   I am taking some kind of Flora thing from the healthfood store, I'll check if that's in it.  I've been eating a LOT Of yogurt too!    I certainly hope I get rid of this fast!!!!

TJ97

Hi I had bilateral mastectomy on September 16th and was doing well until I ended up with blood clots and an infection I had a rash at the time that could only be described as something like poison ivy and my right breast was hot and swollen . About a week ago they went back in and cleaned and flushed everything now its been 9days and I woke up this morning running a fever of 101.6 temp and my right is swelling again I have also had a lot of shortness of breath. my PS put me on another round of keflex and added bactrim this time I'm getting worried that I reinfected after them just doing surgery does anyone have any advice or can relate ?