Second Dental Exam

I had my dental exam this morning, and praise Jesus, everything is fine. No cavities, no gingivitis, no nothing. I'm so glad that I don't have to deal with any sort of dental stuff on top of the TB stuff. Tomorrow the appointment line-up is a 7:30 ultrasound to check out my thyroid, an 8:45 lab appointment to do all my blood and urine tests, and I managed to squeeze in at the Infectious Disease office at 10:45, so hopefully I'll have more answers tomorrow. For my sanity, I would really just like a gameplan of what I'm going to have to do for the TB. I know I'm going to have to take a pill twice a day for months on end, but I don't know how often he's going to require me to come in to be checked out, and how often I have to do the liver panels, and if there's something else I don't know about. Knowing my luck, there will be more stuff, but I guess I'll find out tomorrow. After this last round of appointments, we should hopefully be done with everything, and be able to send off our paperwork to the Peace Corps DC office shortly. I contacted the PC office yesterday to ask about the TB stuff, and she said that as my test was positive she was going to send me paperwork to have the doctor complete regarding if it's dormant/active and what steps I'm doing to get rid of it. So I need to wait for that, and complete it before we send in everything else. My goal to have it done by the end of the month probably wont come to pass, but maybe in the first weeks of December.

TB updates

So I talked to my doctor today, and my assumption that I would just have a chest x-ray and be done with the whole "tuberculosis" thing was completely and utterly false. Apparently I'm going to have to have a 6-9 month antibiotic therapy treatment paired with routine liver panels. Party. And to top it off, during the 6+ months of therapy, I can't drink alcohol. I'm not a lush by any stretch of the imagination, but I do enjoy a glass of wine every so often. It just seems like a low blow. Maybe it's just me. Honestly, I really just don't need one more thing to deal with right now, but it is what it is. The doctor thinks I either got it from working at the After Hours Clinic or riding the city bus, I'll never know either way. Basically I have the bacteria in my lungs, but since I'm a healthy person without a suppressed immune system, my body is not letting it develop. However, if I don't have the antibiotic therapy it will live in my lungs forever and could develop if my immune system was ever suppressed. So Peace Corps or not, I really have to do the stupid therapy. The doctor sent a referral to a specialist today, so I will hopefully be able to start therapy soon.
I spoke to a person in the medical department at the Washington DC office. I was concerned that our applications would be held until I'm done with therapy, in which case we wouldn't leave for at least six months later than scheduled currently. The woman in the office said our applications should still be able to move forward as planned, and as long as I didn't have active TB, could demonstrate that I was seeking treatment, and that my therapy didn't last longer than normal, it should be fine.
Wish us luck.

Here's a little question and answer thing I found online, so hopefully it will answer any lingering questions.



If I have a positive PPD test, do I have tuberculosis?
Usually not. A person can be infected with the bacteria that causes tuberculosis but not actually have active tuberculosis. Many people are infected with the bacteria that causes tuberculosis, but only a few of these people (about 10%) go on to develop active TB.

Healthy people who get infected with the tuberculosis bacteria are often able to fight off the infection and do not develop active TB. The bacteria is dormant (inactive) in their lungs. If the body is not able to contain the infection and the bacteria continues to grow, active tuberculosis develops.

If I do not have active TB, how will my doctor treat my tuberculosis infection?
To be sure that you remain healthy, your doctor may recommend that you take an antibiotic for 6 to 9 months to kill the tuberculosis infection. If you don't take the medicine, the bacteria will remain in your lungs, and you will always be in danger of developing active tuberculosis. The medicine used to treat tuberculosis infection is isoniazid (say: eye-so-nye-ah-zid), which is also called INH. You need to take 1 pill every day for at least 6 months. If you don’t take all your medicine, the tuberculosis may come back.

It is very important that you take the medicine every day. Keep your medicine in a place where you will always see it. Take it at the same time every day. It may help to write yourself a note or set a daily alarm to remind you to take it. Ask your doctor what to do if you forget to take a pill.

People who take INH may have side effects, but these usually do not happen very often. Side effects include a skin rash, an upset stomach or liver disease. Ask your doctor about other possible side effects.

Don't drink alcohol or take acetaminophen (one brand name: Tylenol) while taking INH because this can damage your liver. Always check with your doctor before you take any other medicine because some drugs interact with INH and can cause side effects.

Your doctor may want to monitor you every month. For example you may need to visit your doctor to get another prescription of the medicine you are taking and to monitor any side effects or problems you are experiencing from the medicine. If you are feeling well, your doctor will give you a prescription for the next month.

Tuberculosis? WTF?!

So Ken and I both had to get TB tests done, and I reacted to the shot. Which could mean that I have TB. I really don't think that I have TB, but it means that I have to get a chest x-ray to prove my innocence. Annoying.

Physicals Done!

Ken and I had our physicals done on Thursday. Everything went fine. Dr. Ruscheinsky was awesome and was very aware that everything has to be filled out perfectly. To our benefit, she had another PC physical that she did just last week, so she was pretty familiar with the paperwork and all the random stuff we have to be checked for. There are so many random tests we have to have done. I don't remember the name, but we have to be checked for this certain disease that if we have it and eat fava beans we will die. We've both eaten aforementioned beans in the last few months, and no death, so I'm pretty sure that one will be fine. We have to go down to the After Hours Clinic today to get our TB tests read. One thing that Dr. Ruscheinsky was concerned about was that I have an enlarged thyroid, so I have to go have an ultrasound done on Wednesday. I hope that nothing's wrong, but if I do have a problematic thyroid, I'd rather know now before I get a goiter, cause that's not cute.
On other fronts -- we're moving out to my parent's house this weekend. Hopefully everything totally essential will fit into our new "apartment". We're used to a two bedroom townhouse, and will now be living in a 10'x12' bedroom. Needless to say, we've gotten a storage unit.

Lady-Bits Physical

Another step in this grand medical process was for me to have a gynecological check-up. It was time for me to do it anyway, so no harm there. So yesterday I went in and had my lady-bits examined and swabbed. I'm sure everything will come out dandy, just waiting for the results so I can print them out and add them to the stack of paperwork (*crap*) that we have to send back. Tomorrow, Ken and I have our physicals with our PCP (and it's also our anniversary! Four years down, a gazillion more to go!) Then on Tuesday I have my dental check up. We still need to pick up the paperwork from the eye doctor, but they have to measure the distance between our pupils for some odd reason, and that isn't a part of a regular exam so we have to each go in and get that measured. We were planning on doing that and a bunch of other stuff the last couple of days, but I've felt like complete crud, so nothing else has gotten done. Ah well. Hopefully we can still get everything done by the end of the month. On other fronts, Ken and I are moving out to my parent's house this weekend, so that we can save money. We've gotta be able to pay for our storage unit, and 27 payments is quite a bit of money. So we'll be staying out there until we leave. Adios Whiteaker!

Dental Exam #1

Ken had his teeth cleaned yesterday, and no cavities! Yay! One less thing we have to worry about. The goof forgot his paperwork, so hopefully he had everything done that he was supposed to do, and will drop off the paperwork sometime soon. Luckily, my mama is the office coordinator at our dentist's office so she'll make sure the paperwork gets done snappy. One more step completed!

Shrinking List

Had an excellent suggestion from a blog-reader to eliminate the countries that speak French. As Ken and I don't speak French (or Spanish as was determined in our shenanigans with the possible Latin American placement) the Peace Corps would not be wise, and thankfully not planning to send us to a French speaking country. That actually rules a lot of them out. Additionally, I looked more in depth at each country to see which of them have primary focus on Health Education and Agriculture. Most of the countries in Africa have HIV Health Education programs, but fewer have Agriculture programs, and even fewer have both. So here's the updated list. Of course, Peace Corps can do anything they want, so we could get sent anywhere, but if I had money to gamble, I would pick one of these countries.

Non-French Speaking, Sub-Saharan countries of Africa Currently Accepting Peace Corps Volunteers, and Whose Primary Programs are Health Education and Agriculture:

1. Gambia
2. Ghana
3. Malawi
4. Tanzania
5. Zambia

Much smaller list! :)

Potential Countries

The the most common question I get when I tell people that Ken and I are going to Africa is, "What country?"
Until now, I honestly hadn't looked up specifically what countries are included in the Sub-Saharan group, and which of those are currently hosting volunteers. So here's my list. The list of potential countries is still really long, and most of them are taking volunteers to work with both Agriculture (Ken) and HIV education (me), so that doesn't reduce the list any further, so this is the list for now.

Sub-Saharan African Countries Who Have Current Volunteers
Benin
Botswana
Burkina Faso
Cameroon
Cape Verde
Ethiopia
Gambia
Ghana
Kenya
Lesotho
Malawi
Mozambique
Namibia
Rwanda
Sierra Leone
South Africa
Swaziland
Tanzania
Togo
Uganda
Zambia

Medical/Denal/Vision/Crazy Person Paperwork

So. We got our GIANT packets in the mail on Monday. The to-do list includes:
1. Physicals with PCP and large number of blood tests - Appointments scheduled for November 19th which I find quite telling as that's our wedding anniversary.
2. Dental exams and x-rays: Ken's scheduled for November 10th, and I'm scheduled for November 24th. We're praying for no cavities as we have to have them filled before we will be cleared.
3. Eye exam paperwork. We are both up-to-date on eye exams so this afternoon I'm going to take the forms to be completed to our eye doctors.
4. Statements of our mental sanity. Shockingly enough, the Peace Corps is said to be stressful, difficult, and can cause depression, frustration, and craziness. We both have to write a statement discussing our current sanity, and how we would deal with Peace Corps induced madness.
I'm hoping to have everything completed and in the mail by the end of the month. Wish us luck!