Whooping Cough

[rlyndecker]

I teach in a public school where a student was just diagnosed with Whooping cough (student had been vaccinated). Student was NOT in my class, but many of my students are coughing A LOT. I have been vaccinated too. The principal (being an idiot) said to the entire staff that anyone who has a compromised immune system was supposed to stay home 17 (!) days to be safe. As much as I would love to stay home 17 days, I emailed my Primary Dr. and she isn't concerned at all.

Any ideas/thoughts? I am not in treatment yet. My #'s are "steady"; I go for blood work on Tue. but don't see my Oncologist until end of October.

Thank you!

[djgolding]

whooping cough is infectious within 6 days of being infected then for a further couple of weeks so the likelihood is, if you're going to get it, you'll have caught it. Your Primary Dr is probably right in that there's little to be done if you aren't showing symptoms. It is quite normal to use antibiotics to suppress transmission but the usual precautions of avoiding people with coughs, using good hygiene and maintaining levels of healthy activities should be OK. 17 days off ?with pay - I would take it, its probably better for you than anything else! If you develop anything, then go to your primary doc for treatment of symptoms.

[rlyndecker]

LOL- "with pay" but it uses my sick leave and I only get 10 a year and I usually use them all for sinus infections....We just started the school year so if I can avoid it I prefer not to use it this soon. I'll also need it for stress with this group of students/principal!

Thank you!

[splashsplash in reply to rlyndecker]

I found going off cow's milk and cheese helped to stop the previous endless sinus infections.

[musicgirl]

After getting diagnosed with CLL, I somehow contracted whooping cough. A blood test confirmed I had contracted it. I was very unwell for 7 months. I then had a test to see how my antibody level was for pertussis, and surprisingly I didn't develop any antibodies!! I was retested again recently, and again there were no antibodies. My body really struggled with whooping cough, and basically I was doing quite well with CLL at the time, so maybe better to be sure than sorry.

musicgirl