Rodney E.

Hi, my name Is Rodney and I’m 69 years old.I would like to tell you a little about the biggest scar of my life. It happened on March 7, 2024, I went to bed around 9 pm and soon after I got cold chills and couldn’t stop shivering. I called my daughter and told her what was going on. I told her I wasn’t concerned about the chills because it happened to me before.

I hung up and eventually fell asleep. I woke up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom but I couldn’t move myself very well and ended up on the floor passed out. My daughter came over late the next day and found me on the floor and called 911. I’d been on the floor for over 16 hours when the ambulance came. I came to and found a lot of people in my house and was asked questions to get my response to some questions, I couldn’t tell them what year we are in so they loaded me up and took me to the hospital. I was in the emergency room for 8 hours and only remembered having a CT scan. They put me to sleep and connected me on a ventilator for a couple of days and was placed in ICU. When I woke up, I had no idea why I was in the hospital until a nurse came in and explained what had happened. The doctors diagnosed me with acute respiratory failure, severe sepsis with septic shock, pneumonia, cellulitis, rhabdomyolysis and fatty liver. (Sepsis and Pneumonia, Sepsis and Septic Shock, Sepsis and Cellulitis)

The doctors and nurses were great and they were able to send me to rehab only after a 9 day stay. I was put in rehab to get my strength back and after a week I was sent home.

I was only home for a week and I went back to the hospital because I still had pneumonia and my O2 was only 83.
Another 5 days on meds I was able to go back home. I’ve been home now for a month and doing much better. The only
issue I have is some pain in my lower back and knees. The biggest concern is anxiety, which bothers me almost every
night. I can’t come to grips on why I got so sick so fast. I did hear of sepsis but had no idea how sick it can make you.
Education is our only defense we have, knowing the symptoms can save your life. PLEASE HELP US SURVIVE.