Disease of the Month Club comes through again
(warning: possible dermatological overshare)
Boy, I just can't do anything simply, can I? When I took a shower this morning (taking a shower these days entails a nurse disconnecting the PICC line from the IV stand and wrapping it snugly in plastic and several layers of tape to keep the insertion point dry. The use of biohazard waste bags for wrapping my arm is apparently entirely a matter of convenience, but does lend a certain aura of piquant drama), I found that a small constellation of itchy red marks had formed around around my waist and hips.
Dr. Weissman figured it was a reaction to my antibiotics and started discussing which ones should be scaled back or stopped a few days early. The dermatologist, however, who resenbled a fit and trim Santa Claus, scrutinized the marks (between the cloyingly sweet tomato soup and flavorless cheesburger courses of my supper) and pronounced them Pityriasis Rosea, a mysterious but mild ailment that--if it's what I've got--is entirely unrelated to the HCL, Cladamine, or anything else that's going on. Occam's razor is certainly takinga beating here, boys.
At my suggestion, Charlotte has drawn a thermometer on the whiteboard, in the manner of innumerable fundraising drives. It's graduated to 500, and is currently colored up to 213, my neutrophyl count from yesterday. Apparently the blighters actually have to be counted by hand (or by eyeball, at any rate), so the data tends to be draggy in getting back from the lab. I offered to go down and yell at the lab guys myself, but Dr. Weissmann said that might possibly prove counterproductive. Maybe I should offer to do my own counting instead...