I Was Lucky Enough to Survive (3)

It was chance that helped me survive a medical problem that has been developing for me during the past decade. If not for chance, I would have died.

At the start of October 2008, I was scheduled to travel to Ivory Coast, West Africa in about two weeks. I had an ear infection. How do I know I had an ear infection ? Because juice was coming out of the ear whenever I stuck a Q-tip in either one, a practice I have engaged in for at least 50 years despite those warnings you see now and then that you "should never put Q-tips into your ear." Also, I have had frequent ear infections since my childhood, and I know when one or the other of my ears is infected. Experience does count for something.

I made an appointment with my regular doctor at my HMO. He examined my ear, and claimed that he saw no signs of infection. Luckily, however, he gave me a prescription for an antibiotic which I could take if, during my trip, I "saw any signs of ear infection."

On schedule I went off to Ivory Coast. My ears were obviously infected. My hearing in each year was way down, and I had great trouble understanding what people around me were saying. I started taking the antibiotic, which only helped a little.

Near the end of my stay, I suddenly developed a terrible pain in my side. I knew what caused this -- kidney stones. I had had kidney stones four or five times before, had had them destroyed with lithotripsy at least three times, and had naturally passed them without lithotripsy at least twice. The pain caused by kidney stones is terrible. It is claimed by many that it is worse than childbirth. Once you've had it, you know exactly what it is.

Fortunately, this initial bout with kidney stones in Ivory Coast ended within four or five hoursa. I must have passed the stone naturally. Two days later, however, I had another, more serious bout. My ear problems were also increasing, so I upped the dosage of antiobiotic I was taking. In the middle of the night, I went through heaving respiratory problems I could not control, something that had never happened to me before. By morning, and after a steaming hot bath, the pain went away. I continued taking the antibiotics.

I got on my Air France flight and returned home to Oakland, California. About two days later, I had another bout with serious kidney stone pain, and I also began the same uncontrollable, heaving breathing. It became so bad that my wife, who is bedridden and disabled and cannot drive, called a neighbor and had him take me to the hospital.

No sooner had I arrived at the emergency department when I went into more of the respiratory problems. Luckily I was hustled into the Intensive Care Ward. I remember four or five doctors and nurses hovering over me, shouting instructions to one another, and then I passed out. I went in and out of unconsciousness a few times, I think, but gradually I improved. I spent about a week in Intensive Care, hooked up to so many monitors and intravenous devices that I looked like something out of a science function movie.

Later, a day or so before I was able to leave the hospital, two doctors independently explained to me what had happened. The kidney stone had caused an infection of the kidney. Once that happened, the infection spread throughout my body and began to infect all my organs. Both told me, using identical words, "You were very, very lucky." One of them told me that the antibiotic I had taken for the ear infection had probably bought me enough time to return home and get to the hospital before the situation became fatal.

I owe my life, I think, to that ear infection and the fact that I had with me antibiotics that kept me from going over the edge. I also owe my life to the incredibly fine medical care I had at the Oakland Kaiser Hospital.

After writing this, I am going out to buy some potato salad for my wife and myself to have with our lunch of pot roast. I am going to stop at our favorite Montclair coffeehouse, called Nellie's, and have a cup of their wonderful coffee.