Dear listmembers,
Our friend and fellow list-member Barbara Blake-Krebs is in the
ICU of University of Kansas Medical Center Hospital in Kansas City. She
was admitted on Saturday after an episode of "thrashing" dyskenesia,
caused her temperature to rise to 105 degrees. Her temperature is down
now and she is stable, but her husband Fred Krebs wrote that she will be
in the hospital for about another week, while they are reworking her
meds. He asked that I post the following to the list and welcomes any
suggestions you could offer on Barb's problems. He'd appreciate replies
to his e-mail address which is: [log in to unmask]
I'm sure Barb would also appreciate your messages of support. I'll
print out any list postings and mail them to her.
Barb - keep up the fight.
Linda Herman
Here is Fred's letter:
From: [log in to unmask]
To: [log in to unmask]
Cc: [log in to unmask]
Date: Wed, 22 Mar 2000 00:54:15 EST
Subject: Re: Re: Barb is in hospital
Linda, Barbara would like to see what the folks on the list serve would
have
to say about her situation. I am with her at the hospital a great deal
or I
am teaching, so my replies may lapse a day or so. Please let them
respond to
my e-mail address. Here is the situation as I understand it.
For some time Barbara has had a lot of dyskenisia right after taking
her
Sinemet 25/100 7to 8 tablets daily 1 or 2 tablets at a time 5 or six
times
a day. She also takes 3 mirapex daily, 0ne at a time and 3 Tasamar
daily,
also one pill three times a day. She takes elavil (3 tablets) at about
10 pm
each evening. She will take 1 or 2 xanax during the day.
During Spring Break March 13-17 I was home and she had some more
violent "thrashing" episodes on 3/14 and 3/15, but starting about 6 pm
CST on 3/17 she had several back to back episodes and then after elavil
she joined our dinner party and ate some corned beef. 3/18 she had
episodes and by 11:00 Am she would not respond to my questions although
she was still breathing and had a pulse. A Ambulance took her to KU Med
where she had a 140 pulse, a 105 temp and bp of 58 over 31.
The high temp was due to rhabdomyolysis which is a neuroleptic malignant
syndrome. the aggravated muscles released enzymes into the blood stream
which overworked the kidneys. We are told that there is "no good Reason"
as
to why this happened . Rhabdo is associated with anti-psychotic drugs
which
Barb is not taking and they function almost opposite to sinement. Barb
has
been regular and disciplined in the use of her medications and yet
sinemet
seems to be the culprit. One of the docs in ICU has researched for this
type
of "monster" dk and has found only one reported instance of rhabdo
associated
with regular use of levadopa. Barb is stable now on most vital signs.
She
is doing 6 1/2 tabs a 1/2 tab every 3 hours and in these early
stages
there seems to be little dk and no rhabdo. Any comments or suggestions?
Fred Krebs
[log in to unmask]
