To think this could be meningitis?

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My daughter, 28 and pregnant with her first child has had excruciating headaches and an upset stomach for a few days. She is in hospital and so far has had blood tests showing no infection but a high white blood count of 28. The normal range is between 4 and 10. Blood pressure is low, this also indicates meningitis I believe.

I am referring here to viral meningitis. Does anyone have any experience of this?

It could be about a zillion things. Most infections and many other conditions will put up your white cell count and headache/upset stomach have hundreds of possible causes too, as does a low blood pressure.

You must be very worried but try to resist using Dr Google - it will only make the anxiety worse . Hope she is better soon.

Her other symptoms are a mildly stiff neck, no appetite but extremely thirsty.

We are waiting for the results from testing her spinal fluids.

If they have tested her spinal fluid, they will soon know if it's meningitis or not. Viral meningitis (if that is what it turns out to be) is MUCH less serious than bacterial meningitis and usually requires no treatment apart from painkillers.

The doctors have put her in an individual room away from the other patients. I imagine they think she could be contagious?

Thankyou for your kind words. It's very worrying waiting for results.

The doctor suggestd they cannot diagnose viral meningitis, only rule out other more serious conditions. They have said it's almost certainly not bacterial meningitis.

They may also want to protect her and her baby from other peoples lurgies.

Oh god, how worrying :(
Hope you get some results soon x

Viral meningitis is not contagious as such. You can pass the virus on to someone else but is very unlikely they would also get meningitis from it. The viruses that cause meningitis are mainly bog-standard viruses that cause coughs and colds. If you are unlucky, you can get meningitis from them but you usually won't.

It's normal procedure to put anyone with a possible infective illness in a side-room till they know what it is but it doesn't mean anything bad e.g. that they think it's serious. They would put anything potentially infectious, even a mild tummy bug, in a side room.

Re diagnosis - you cannot usually grow the actual virus from spinal fluid but you can find other signs of infection in the spinal fluid so they should have a very good idea whether or not it's meningitis once they have got the results of the lumbar puncture (spinal tap).

Anyoneforturps, even if it's the viral strain?

The initial response from the spinal fluid looks clear but we have to wait for some other results.

She keeps falling asleep and seems so lethargic.

I had viral meningitis and was diagnosed via a lumber puncture.

My symptoms were excruciating headache that didn't 'come and go' but just 'came and came'

Stiff neck

Drowsiness / hard to wake

Photophobia (couldn't bear light)

I was on an isolated ward for 4 days even though it was never life threatening in any way. And then in bed for about 3 weeks.

It was miserable and the headaches were something else. But not dangerous.

HTH.

I hope she's OK, but she's in the best place. Try not to worry til you have some answers.

We have been told the lumbar puncture is inconclusive. Slightlyjaded, did you get much more information with your diagnosis? Is it correct that they not diagnose VM by ruling out all other possibilities?

Does anyone know about white blood cell counts? The doctor says it would have to be at least 300 before they thought there was an infection or virus.

I think you may have misunderstood about the white cell count. Even a small rise can indicate an infection (though there are many other causes of a raised white cell count too). What the doctor probably meant was that a level of 28 isn't all that high and wouldn't ring alarm bells as being a serious infection.

How is your DD this morning?

That's along the lines of what the doctor said, a slight increase could be a result of having a headache.

She still has a terrible headache this morning but blood pressure was up last night, now it is down again. She is staying in for now.

Headaches are weird things. Sometimes they just go away and you never really get to the bottom of what caused them. At least it sounds as if the hospital is investigating it thoroughly.

Hope she's better soon .

You can get terrible headaches in pregnancy anyway. I got really bad ones with #3. Would put me flat on my back for days and pain killers didn't touch it at all.

As others have said viral meningitis is the milder form. One friend of mine had it and she couldn't move her head sideways or up and down. Mildly stiff neck doesn't even begin to describe it.

Hopefully she'll be better soon.