Donna P.

My name is Donna; in 2018 I was diagnosed with sepsis and nearly died. I went to the hospital on February 14, 2018, after the Z-Pac I received from my doctor on February 12, 2018, was not helping and my ear had ruptured and was leaking reddish fluid. (Sepsis and Bacterial Infections)

When I arrived at the hospital I was freezing cold, my glands in my neck were the size of golf balls, and my left ear had ruptured. They took blood and tested for mono along with a C-scan of my neck since it was so swollen. The test for mono came back negative. Even though I could hardly sit up the ER told me to go home and come back if I got worse. By February 15, 2018, within 24 hours I was making no sense. I could not wake up enough to call for help. On February 16, not even 48 hours after the ER sent me home, a friend came to check on me and called the ambulance immediately.

When the ambulance arrived my heart rate was 170+ and they could not bring it down. When I arrived at the hospital it took them 45 minutes, according to the ER report to just get me stable. They had no clue what was causing my issues. They were trying wide spread antibiotics with no luck. They put me in ICU still unresponsive to anything. When I finally started coming around late on February 16, 2018, I had no clue where I was. How I got there. I was told they were not sure if I would pull through, my heart rate was still over 170+ and they could not find a cocktail of antibiotics to work. At some point that night they came back and told me I had sepsis but none of the normal treatments were working.

I ended up spending 5 days in the ICU, drifting in and out of reality. At one point I thought the hospital was trying to hurt me I ripped out all 5 of my IVs and tried to leave. I could not make it very far. Not even out of the room. At day 5 they needed the bed so they sent me home with IV antibiotics and pills to bring down my heart rate. Since February 16, 2018, I have felt very tired, drained, my heart is unable to keep a normal heart rate with pills. I have developed PMR (polymyalgia rheumatica) due to the sepsis and I am now in stage 3b of kidney failure. It seems like my organs or slowly failing a little every day.