Saturday – more spots, Sunday she was really bad, was throwing up, was cold but had a temperature. In the end I called the hospital again and my husband took her in at 8pm. They admitted her for tonsillitis and dehydration and said she had to stay in overnight. But this rash – not like chicken pox now, more blotchy and not crusting or having a head at all – was a mystery.
The next day they started treating her for Kawasaki disease, they gave her aspirin and a drug to calm down the infection and reduce the swelling in her blood vessels.
By Thursday there was no change so we were referred to St George’s in London to be monitored and see if they could figure it out. I kept mentioning that I thought the rash was getting worse just after the penicillin but no one took any notice until the Friday. Saturday she was put on a different antibiotic, was going cross eyed, her heart rate was slow and erratic at times, she'd had a heart scan which showed fluid round it, they now decided she needed a ct scan and a lumbar puncture.
Saturday night we were given the diagnosis of bacterial meningitis. Luckily, my pushing about the antibiotics meant she had been on the right antibiotics to treat the meningitis for 36 hours already. She spent the next week getting better, her eyes went back to normal after three days and she came home after six days on the antibiotics and had her last lot yesterday (September 2011). She seems to have no side effects, she has a hearing test on Monday and will need blood tests done in a few weeks to check and make sure everything is alright
LEANNE ROPER
SEPTEMBER 2011