LE and getting a tetanus shot

Everyone should get immunized for tetanus (now combined with "adult" diphtheria) every 10 years so you are probably overdue! Surprised your primary care person has not tracked this for you...

If your LE is not bilateral, get it on the unaffected side for sure. 

I had mine in my unaffected arm.  If both affected, get it in the hip as Boobs in a Box said.

Glennie, at first I misread your post and thought you said if LE is bilateral to get the shot in the boobs! I am laughing now, but I was beginning to freak out here--I need to read more closely!

My primary doc wouldn't finish my pre-op exam without the tetanus shot, so yes very good idea to have it done.

glenni19, Hi, did you have any more swelling in your swollen areas after the tetanus shot? I just got accidentally poked in my swollen inside of rt. wrist with an old nail! I washed it with soap and water and put alcohol and peroxide on it. My arm is spongy there, so it was like an indentation poke that broke the skin a little, the peroxide boiled in the wound. Doesn't look too bad now. I read somewhere about tetanus vaccine making lymphedema worse. Thank you! If anyone else will respond I would welcome the advice. I do live on a farm. My husband had a bad stroke two plus years ago and I am his care giver plus I care for some outside pets. A board was loose. I tried to fix and it flipped and poked my sore arm. Smart! Not! I am worried.

Hmmm....I have had some mild lymphedema in the breast where I had surgery that I think is related to a seroma that hasn't reabsorbed. Oddly, I had to get a tetanus shot in August due to dropping a pair of garden sheers that then punctured my leg right above my knee. Very painful and very dirty. I managed to clean it out and avoid infection, but my doctor insisted on a tetanus shot since I hadn't had one since 1999. The wound was on the opposite side of my surgery side, and the shot was also on the opposite side, but oddly, a few days later I noticed that my breast was more swollen than usual. I had attributed the extra swelling to drinking alcohol on a wine tasting tour, but now I wonder if it had something to do with the tetanus shot. I had had some minor swelling prior to that, but the day or two after my shot was when the swelling was visibly noticeable even when I was dressed. I had never considered that the tetanus shot could have anything to do with it, but now I'm not so sure. Interesting.

SUPer52, Thank you for your input. Haven't decided what to do. This being on my swollen arm it is more worrysome!

Hello again SUPer52, I wanted to ask you if your swelling had gone back down? I am in a catch 22 on whether to take the tetanus shot or not. I lost 17 nodes and, my left breast. In surgery the pathologist could not determine if she was seeing anything in the first node and she held up surgery trying to make up her mind whether she was seeing something microscopic! This was at a University doctor training hospital, in Mo. Well, the doctor decided to do axillary dissection. In other words, my armpit! I had, had ultrasound of my armpit at two different hospitals. They both showed perfectly normal nodes. The hospital where I had my surgery the ultrasound tech said my nodes were beautiful!! The last thing I said to my doctor, who had put her initials above my breast, was, Please don't take any more nodes than necessary! She was a mean hearted sarcastic Dr. but I trusted her to do the right thing for me. I woke up to 17 nodes gone and a tissue expander in place. I was horrified! All the nodes were perfect except they said they thought the first one had a micro met .2-2mm in size. That is about like the tip of a ball point pin, and considered node negative!! She had let a student Dr. remove my nodes, in training, we all suspected and I was a guinea pig! I had nothing but trouble with the tissue expander. Student Drs. would expand it with about 60 cc saline. They used a big long needle to do this and it hurt. I noticed after a few trips to have this done I was not expanding much. My arm and breast area began to swell. I developed lymphedema. I got so upset , I got shingles on my back. After more than a year I was tired of the expander and it seemed to be shrinking, I could feel the edges of it. They said it has to come out. I was upset but excepted it. It was removed at Columbia Mo. The tissue expander was flat!! They had pierced it with the needle! All the liquid had leaked out into my body. My husband said the doctor looked terribly upset and told him that I did not get a fair shake up there at all. I was in recovery. Nine days later with stitches and drains I came down sick with a weird sickness. Vomiting and diarrhea, real bad and I was getting dehydrated. I begged them at our local hospital ER to take out the drains. Columbia Drs. Said no, they were the only ones who could take it out. They cat scanned me from my neck down and called three surgeon's. They thought I had Ileitis. Thank God I didn't. I have been through so much! My husband I have been married to since I was 17 had a major stroke. I had been out of surgery about seven months. I have taken him to many doctors and he got therapy and had home nursing care for awhile. I brought him home with a feeding tube, he couldn't walk at all and barely whisper. He walks with a walker now and is not doing well. Just pain and anxiety meds for both of us. Less than five years ago we were go getters. Well, to get back to my original question about swelling after tetanus vaccination. I was wondering if I do swell more, will it go back to normal or advance more? It is sneaky the way it swells a little at a time. I had therapy and learned to do massage therapy that is very gentle and I do wear a sleeve for long periods of time. I read two horror stories about some ladies who had breast CA several years ago, got the tetanus shot and one ladies arm swelled a lot, 6" I think. The other had swelling too. She had wrappings and the swelling went away finally after going through all that! She was traveling to another country and had to have a tetanus vaccine. I am not up on my vaccine. I have two more days to decide. I did read that the vaccine can harm some people and make lymphedema worse or cause it to start after years. I don't want lock jaw though. The wound doesn't look bad just swelled more. I would not think twice about getting it if I had no swelling. My left wrist and arm are over one inch and a half bigger than rt. I have it around where the drain and expander came out too and trunk area on left. I wrote my story to help others. Get second opinions! If a Dr. feels wrong, get another Dr. I cannot express the awful treatment I got. I would NEVER go to another teaching hospital! I'm sorry if this was long and I only told you part of it. I think I have PTSD. I used to never even take a tylenol! The good news.... I had a 21 gene test at Springfield Mo. called Oncotype. Out of a possible score of 0-100. I scored about a 7. I didn't have chemo or radiation because of the low score. I had stage 2 because of the size of the tumor.

If anyone has a story similar to mine, I would love to hear from you and please opinions on the tetanus shot. Especially you SUPer52.

Sorry I wrote you a book! 😊🌸🙏🌸 my best to everyone!!🙏

Farmlover - except for the last few posts, this thread has not been active since 2014 so you probably will not get answers.

Like KSusan - I get all shots in my thigh or butt. I get all blood draw from my foot/ankle.

SUPer52, Thank you for responding. I believe I am fine right now anyway. You have given me good advice. All shots will be in my hip on unaffected side, if I have any. So glad your swelling went back down to at least the level it was. I wish there would be more educated doctors on lymphedema and that more will be done to help us in the future. Yes it was awful! and the second surgery didn't help it any either. Thanks so much and I wish you and all the ladies going through any of this breast cancer situations the very best!! I wanted to warn other ladies to get second opinions and avoid Dr. training hospitals. Got the hugs! 😁 💗 🙏

Thank you too MinusTwo! 🙏🌸💖