Staph infection part 2 - antibiotics still won't work

[Dark Stranger]

My doctor didn't express concern that the infection I have is the antibiotic-resistant staph bacteria MRSA, so I don't think I need to entirely lose sleep over that. But sometimes I wake up with awful headaches, all of them occurring right between my eyes and occasionally near my eyebrows too. This indicates to me that I'm having sinus headaches, but I have never heard of a staph infection in the sinuses (the nose, yes, but not the sinus cavities). I also have what feels like eye strain - the area aorund my eyes feels a little bit sore, which I know is also a sign of a sinus infection. My vision is fine.

I was on an antibiotic called Augmentin for two weeks and it knocked my headaches out for a while, but they returned about three weeks later. During my period of no headaches, I finished the round of Augmentin and was put on another antibiotic called Bactrim. I have no idea if this stuff is even helping me because I still have bad headaches. I cannot return to my doctor for another two months because I've since returned to college in a city where I have no doctor.

I am trying to remain calm because I have been looking up the symptoms of staph infections and I keep getting results back of MRSA symptoms. I have noticed that the symptoms, aside from things like rashes and fever associated with MRSA, are more or less the same for any staph infection. I have the headaches, I have the fatigue, and I have what I think is chest pain not associated with heart problems (the pain is more under my armpit than dead center in my chest).

I have another week or two on the Bactrim, so I'll see what happens.

[leea1206]

Can you go to the student health center and get treatment if the bactrim doesn't help?

As you probably already know, MRSA, is fairly serious, in that standard antibiotics can't treat it.

[Dark Stranger]

leea1206,

My school has no student health center, so if the Bactrim doesn't work, I will either need to go to the local emergency room and hope I get taken seriously, or wait two months to go back home and see my doctor and hope whatever I have does not worsen. I really do not think I have MRSA because I do not have the bizarre sores on my skin that seem to be major indicators of the disease; honestly, I feel like I have a sinus headache. I'm hoping it helps, though - from what I gather, Bactrim is sometimes prescribed in instances of staph infections in the rare event of MRSA (apparently Bactrim can still cure the infection even if the bacteria is the resistant type). Usually when I take antibiotics that work, I feel better within a could of days and finish the dose. And Bactrim is pretty potent, so I'm going to have a few words with my doctor if these meds don't help me.

I know MRSA is serious, but I also know there's about 30 different kinds of staph bacteria and that a staph infection does not automatically guarantee presence of the dreaded MRSA (from what I have gathered, most staph infections are fairly common and aren't any more life-threatening than an ear infection). I'm trying to be optimistic since I am very prone to anxiety attacks over my health.

[janewhite1]

Symptoms of MRSA are exactly the same as symptoms of other staph infections. The ones you hear about are the horrible ones, but it is possible to recover from a staph infection without any treatment, in fact, people do it all the time. (Don't recommend it for the serious ones, though!)

Can you go to a local walk-in clinic, or just make an appointment with a doctor in the area? You might have to pay, but sometimes in life we gotta pay for stuff. If the doctor thinks you still have an infection, insist on a culture.

[Dark Stranger]

I don't know if the hospital I go to has an acute care/outpatient/walk-in clinic. I have gone to another hospital where I live and I got told I'd have to wait three weeks before being seen in the outpatient clinic (since I was not a patient at that hospital already)and I don't know if this is a policy that is the same through all hospitals or just that one.

I need to call my doctor back home anyway because I've begun to experience some weird chest pain (which I know is a symptom of a staph infection) and my headaches came back. This new pain may not be related to my infection since I had chest pain around this same time last summer too (leading me to believe that I might have some undiagnosed allergy that is seasonal).