Nancy Tomback

I am a 68 year old woman who was very active, working as a realtor, playing pickleball, traveling and biking, etc. I was in small town Florida when I had a UTI. I went to Urgent Care, as few hospitals were available and was given the wrong antibiotic – 3 more times I went to ER where I was given wrong antibiotics or wrong doses. My UTI became a kidney infection and then sepsis. (Sepsis and Urinary Tract Infections)

I finally could fly home to AZ 5 weeks later, where I went into intensive care/hospital for 2 weeks. I am now 9 months post-sepsis. I am appalled at the medical community who let me check out of the hospital (7 doctors signed me out) and none told me anything nor gave me any paperwork explaining what post-sepsis is, the symptoms, websites and support groups that could assist, nor the time it takes to heal. At a minimum, they could hand a piece of paper to sepsis survivors with this information. It is a huge breach of their medical responsibility.

I’m writing to say sepsis gets better, but it takes time and as all have said, “you can’t see sepsis”. I look fine and that is hard for family/friends to understand. I still have symptoms that come and go; fatigue, joint pain, lack of appetite to name a few. I was fortunate in being able to search on my own for information that made me feel my symptoms were normal and I wasn’t going to die. Not everyone has that capability nor access. I hope all sepsis survivors can get medical information; it must be required by the medical community everywhere to make this extremely difficult situation more bearable.