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Symptoms of an infectious disease like tuberculosis

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About a year ago I traveled through the High Desert in CA and then to Sedona and Phoenix, AZ. One morning while in Phoenix I woke up with a weird rash on my chin, it was several symmetrical dots lined up in a square pattern as if I had fallen asleep on some kind of patterned fabric but the rash was raised and stuck around for a few days. It may be worth mentioning that I did notice swollen lymph nodes in my armpits shortly before I left but my doctor said it was nothing to worry about. Those same lymph nodes are still swollen today.

I then started vomiting very frequently and getting really bad night sweats. After many different tests (CT, Gastro dumping, etc...) I was told that I would just have to live with the vomiting and was put on Marinol to try and control it a little bit. I still vomit about every other day and have night sweats every night (Even though I turn down the heater to 60 at night).

About 5 weeks ago I came down with severe flu like symptoms. No treatment was given


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replied October 20th, 2009
Infectious Diseases Answer A7544
The data you provided (weird rash on the chin one year ago, swollen lymph nodes in the armpits, vomiting, and night sweats) might be related to an infective disease. The disease might be related to an insect, for example, a tick, which is responsible for transmitting lyme disease or borreliosis. Lyme disease is associated with the characteristic “bull’s eye” erythema (which was not reported), but many other insect-vector infective diseases might cause the symptoms you reported.


Night sweats and “clouds” on the X-ray are characteristic for tuberculosis, but might be related to many other conditions, too. The white blood count (WBC)- 12.3 and 16.2 a few days later indicate the presence of infection, but are not high enough for more serious conditions.


The presence of MRSA abscesses additionally complicates the situation. MRSA stands for methicillin-resistant staphylococcus aureus which means that this type of bacteria is already resistant to certain of the most used antibiotics. If the bacteria spread out of the abscesses, then it might cause more serious infections, which might be related to certain of the symptoms you mentioned.


You might want to visit a specialist for tuberculosis for serologic tests which would confirm or rule out tuberculosis. Contacting a specialist in infective diseases might also be helpful. Providing the data that the symptoms actually started on your journey in a specific area might give the doctor a clue which insect might have transmitted the disease and which infection to search for.


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