chest infection querying tb

[tjacksonpfc]

Hi all I've had a cold for about a week which went to my chest. Ive been taking my ventolin inhaler. Anyway got up this morning coughed once and brought up a mouthfull of bright red blood this happened twice. I phoned my gp and got straight in to see the gp. She asked me if i had been working with children as one of the schools by us have had a tb outbreak.

I said i had but I don't work at the school in question I work at the one in the next village. She is phoneing there medical centre to see if there has been any cases there. In the mean time ive got to go for a chest x-ray and have been put on a 7 day course of antibiotics to take. Has anyone had any dealing with tb and will the chest x-ray show up if i have it or will I need more tests. How do they treat it as we are on holiday the 20th August.

TIA

All I know is that my niece had TB a couple of years ago- she was travelling abroad and had a large lump on her side -this was operated on and eventually TB diagnosed- she had 6 months of antibiotics - is fine now.

Thanks for that 6 months of antibiotics sounds a nightmare.

has anyone else had any experiance of this.

Shameless bump for the afternoon/ evening group

Last bump then ill go and cough in the corner on my own

I had this happen to me when I worked with undesirables in London. I'd had a cough for ages, my dr picked up on it at a routine appointment for something else and sent me for an X-ray. I had an appointment with a consultant who said the scan was fine andi had to have a lung function tests and a blood test which were both fine too.

I didn't have tb, I just smoked to much (not any more!)

Fingers crossed you will be seen as quick as I was, it was only a matter of weeks from first referal to all clear.

Good luck.

Sorry you are feeling so ill

Were you not immunised against TB at school?

I am asthmatic and had a horrible dose of the flu which turned into pneumonia and coughed up blood with that. I was in hospital for 4 days, on antibiotics for about a fortnight and steroids for 3 months.

tys for replys. stupefy Thats what the gp was worried about a lot of the kids at or school are foreign so come from countrys that dont imunise against it, hence the heightend risk.

jemimamuddledup Yes I was immunised for tb when i was at school but they have sinced found out that the vaccine only last 15-20yrs and its not a 100% immunisation.

Ive been and had the chest xray today but seeing as the hospital i had it done at is stuck in the 1950s it will take 7-10 days for results to come back.

I didn't realise that about the TB immunisation.

I would imagine if they find something nasty on the x-ray they will contact you before that. When I had pneumonia I had a blood test and was told it would take about 4 days to get the results back, I actually had a phone call to admit me straight to hospital within 24 hours when they saw how high my white blood cell count was.

I didn't realise about the tb immunisation until gp told me today. Also we stopped immunising against it in 2005 in this country. The gp has told me if my inhalers stop working for me just to go straight to A&E for treatment. Fingers crossed they keep working for me ontop of the antibiotics im on. I hate hospitals lol.

I would have thought it is unlikely to be TB, it is really very hard to catch, the rule of thumb is that you have to be sat within a metre of someone coughing up TB for about an hour to catch it. In general it is only very close contacts like family who are at risk so I wouldn't worry too much. Your doc is probably just playing it safe.

more info

I'm currently on the course of antibiotics for it as I have latent TB which was picked up in pre screening for another medical condition. Hospital did say that it was very unlikely that I'd picked it up here but they do think I got it on a business trip abroad
I had chest x-rays and a blood test called a quantiferon gold tb test.
The anti-biotics aren't great (nausea, constipation, no alcohol) but they are necessary so I can live with them.