I had what started out as a zit or infected hair on my thigh. It began to become very painful and swollen, so after about 3-4 days of this I went to the hospital. They were going to make me stay over night, but instead decided to drain it and then get me all pumped up on painkillers and antibiotics.
For anyone who has had such a thing. How long does it take to be back to normal. I asked the Dr. when I could start training and he said that I couldnt swim for a week, but could do everything else as long as could handle the pain. The problem is…that when you ask a non-triathlete about training, I dont think they have a clue what you are talking about.
Here is a link to the staph infection Peter Reid had. It appears it cost him about a month and a
We had this go through the family as kids when my Dad was stationed in the Philippines. The Staph bacteria is normally present on everbody’s skin. If it stays there, no problem. But, if it literally gets under your skin, big problem. Even worse still, if it gets into the blood stream, a systemic infection follows which can be extremely dangerous to the point of lethal. A doctor suspecting a systemic staff infection will prescribe antibiotics immediately, even before the identity of the bug is confirmed by tests. Waiting for proper ID could be a fatal delay. To make matters even scarier, is a strain called MRSA, methicillin resistant Staphalococcus aureus, which is resistent to all major antibiotics except vancomycin. If this bug develops resistence to vancomycin, there will be a major disaster in most large hospitals.
Okay, have a scared you enough, yet? A couple of weeks is probably reasonable to get the existing infections cleared up. You want to practice very good hygiene during this period. Way back when, my younger brother ended up with a severe case, I suspect because of his age (10) and naturally less hygenic. Change clothes daily, don’t rewear items, particularly underwear. Definitely don’t do that Slowtwitch time honored tradition of seeing how many days you can rewear your cycling shorts before washing them. Do other people a favor and stay away from the pool. Last and not least, do not be tempted to “pop” any “zits”. Staff produces boils which makes a zit look like a flea bite in comparison. Trying to pop a boil can result in generating the systemic infection, i.e. get the staff bacteria into the blood stream. That will gaurantee you a hospital stay.
I am recovering from MRSA right now. Full blown infection during the first week of December. It took about 3 weeks to really start to feel ok again. I resumed my normal schedule and have slipped into a state of overtrained. Take the comeback very slowly, it will be a while before all the fitness returns.
What kind of effects does it have on athletic performance. I realize I am going to have a major cut on my leg from the incission, but other than that will my body be able to handle training? I know the antibiotics they have me on will hinder training. Does the staph infection itself do anything to your body through a performance standpoint.
It was alot more than if I had just taken the time off. I only had one week where I did nothing at all. After about day 7 the infection was pretty much defeated and the infection sites ( I had several) had started healing very well. I started with easy spinning and slooooow runs. It seems that my body burnt up alot of my fitness fighting off the infection. I lost alot of power on the bike. My easy spinning on my trainer dropped two gears and the duration at which I could do anything has dropped. Swimming was just ugly for a few weeks.
Of course, I tried to fix this with a few hard breakthrough workouts which felt great but ended up making the situation far worse. My doctors cleared me to go ahead with each step. Just be very conservative when you get back moving again. These infections kill people and take alot out of you.
All related to the original surgery - ACL reconstruction. I had 3 surgeries for the staph infection over the course of 18 months. The first two tried to excise it, the third removed infected tissue and one of the screws from the ACL surgery.
What finally cured it as some superpowered antibiotics.
Hopefully you can get yours fixed in one go. Demand strong antibiotics, and I would suggest blood tests to make sure it’s gone. I was getting CBC with differential tests every week for 6 months to make sure I was staying clean.
It depends on where your incision is; mine was on the front of my knee, which was a huge problem. I had to actually do PT twice post-surgery. Big setbacks.
Good luck, and I hope your prognosis is better than mine was!
Not entirely true. I treat MRSA all the time. Gold std. is IV Vancomycin, however, many strains are somewhat sensitive to other, older, traditional po abx (like Bactrim). Also, there is a (relatively) new po antibiotic called Zyvox that is equally as effective as IV Vanco for MRSA (but it sure costs $$).
If it was just an infected faruncle/carbuncle (superficial/ucomplicate skin-skin), you should be fine in about 10 days (assuming a proper I & D and culture results show sensitivities to whatever you are taking).
On the hygeine note. Be sure to wash your sheets, don’t reuse towels,razors, wipe down your exercise equipment w/a FDA approved solution. I have seen people go through thier course of antibiotics and get rid of the infection and then re-infect themselves with an old razor, or used towel. WE are talking about this MRSA but did the ER culture a sample after they lanced your lesion? And if it is MRSA and you are on Keflex I would see your dr. because it may get a liitle better but the Keflex won’t kill it entirely. Do a search on MRSA it may help you more.
I got it triggered from sea itch, but the basis was a very stressed body from overtraining and a lot of work. My body just broke down and the staph took hold. Took about 3 weeks for getting back to reasonableness. But I treated it with mega sleep in addition to the drugs (keflex).
All I can say is watch it very carefully, and disinfect everything that you might have used around the lag (tweezers for the ingrown hair, razor, etc) You can die from a staph infection. The college I coach at had 5 guys get it and one got put in the hospital and had to have surgery. Apparently it is all over college campuses these days. Be very carefull.
You’re lucky. I had a friend who had an open blister on his foot and he picked up a staph infection from a swimming pool. Within 48hrs, he had NF (“flesh eating disease”) on his left leg and lower left abdomen and toxic shock to boot. He nearly died in the ER. Super powerful antibiotics via IV for 10-12 days, then followup blood tests. He seemed fine, no necrosis. That was August. Now the lymphatic system in his affected leg is hosed; he can not run, play soccer, swim, anything. He can barely ride a bike. He has massage 2x week and PT 2X week to try and drain the fluid out of his leg. His leg is covered in open oozing sores, it is perpetually swollen, and causes him severe pain. He has to wrap it every day, and the amount of time on wound management is huge.
Staph can be so serious, but cases like my friends are really really rare. Just be happy that you didn’t have a worse situation.
I had MRSA and it took well over a year to recover fully. The infection would disappear completely, and then suddenly pop up again, and I would be back in the hospital for another round of IV antibiotics. I wound up with something like 5 seperate overnight stays, and almost died on 2 occasions.
Really scary stuff.
I wound up having to plug every orifice with antibiotic ointment (for a month,) in conjunction with a final round of IV meds to kill the damn thing.
Be really, really careful, and make sure you are really over the infection before you put yourself in a position that could be life threatening (as in don’t travel, dont go on a long camping trip, make sure you have someone you can call to take you to the hospital if that cut in your leg blows up to the size of an orange in 4 hours, and you wake up from a nap with a 105 degree fever…)
Thank you for the responses. I am on two different type of antibiotics (Keflex and something I dont know the name of off the top of my head, but it is for the severe stuff). I am supposed to go back to the Dr. on Tuesday. Right now I have packing in the area that was lanced to help keep the wound open so it can drain. I was really swollen and in a lot of pain before it was lanced. I am going to be very cautious with this.
As long as I can handle it, would it effect me if I resumed training?
You’ve already gotten some good advice and suggestions. Here’s my $.02 worth: I had the same thing last July. Looked like a small zit or ingrown hair on my lower leg, watched it over three days get worse, was in the doctors office on the fourth day and started on some antibiotics while waiting lab results. The culture showed MRSA and which antibiotics it would be more susceptible to. I switched antibiotics after the culture came back. I didn’t have to get it lanced because I caught it early, but had I waited any longer the pain in my leg would have been unbearable. I waited until the wound closed completely before going back in the water and kept it covered with a large bandage at all times partially to keep germs out and partially because it was so gross looking. I was back to my normal training in about 3 weeks but felt physically drained a little longer probably from the heavy antibiotics.
Unfortunately I had a reoccurence in November but caught it even earlier. I knew what to look for and didn’t waste anytime making an appointment. I didn’t go in the water for about two weeks this time and was able to keep doing my other things. Both times the pain slowly subsided over several days.
Hope it heals quickly. Good luck at IMAZ - you’ll do great!
If I missed this on the posts I am sorry. Did you have a culture swab done? When I read your post my first thought was may be MRSA. You have lots of good posts on the subject. But am a nurse I deal with MRAS EVERY day. Scary shit take it slow STAPH is nothing to mess with. I hope all ST get something from the posts. IF YOU GET AN INFECTION THAT SPREADS GET IT CHECKED!
Take it easy for a while. There was a lot of good advice given by STers on this infection. Here is a pic of the infection which is Staph for education purposes.
Actually they did not do a culture swab, which worries me after reading these post. I was wondering about activity too. I am about to get on the trainer for a bit just to go through some motions. Would this not be a good idea. I am on pain killers and can tolerate light activity. Will exercise supress my immune system and delay healing.
Also, My lymph nodes in my groin by the site of infection are very swollen and sore. I first thought I had a hernia, but the dock checked me for one and it was negative.
The Dr. kept mentioning that it looked a bit necrotic?? which I think means that the skin is dying (almost scab like)
For everyone that says it took them a few weeks to get back to normal, what would you consider not being normal, was this because of the medication, pain, or weakend immune system
Will exercise suppress my immune system and delay healing. Answer is yes very much so. Solution…kick back… eat healthy…drink plenty of fluids (water)…take supplements that will boost your immune system…get lots of sleep…get a second opinion…your investment in health is so very important…take the time off…you can always get back to your condition level easy once your body heals itself. Remember your immune system is compromised.