5th Disease?

[airial95]

Yesterday, my non-PANDAS daughter wakes up with a small rash on her leg. By the time we were ready to leave for day care, it had covered her body from head to toe and she looked like a little cherry tomato - poor thing. Off the Dr, who said she's got 5th Disease and is out of shcool for the week. He told me that she's highly contaigious, and has been for the last 2-3 days, to keep an eye on my son for symptoms.

 

Our Ped is the one treating my PANDAS son, and he asked how he'd been doing and I took to opportunity to gush at how much better he's been, after 2 mo on azith I feel like we're about 80% back to normal! It was great.

 

Until my son got home from day care. His behavior charts (we have school tracking) were off the scales! He had a horrible day, and worse evening, even banging his head against the edge of the kitchen table for no real reason. This morning my hubby took him to school (since I had to stay home with my little tomato) and he finally got a glimpse of what I had been going through daily at drop off prior to the antibiotics - it was a nightmare, almost a full blown regression for him.

 

While he's not showing any signs of symptoms of the rash, and 5th disease is viral - not bacterial - is it possible that since he's been exposed his little immune system is in overdrive because of that, causing a backslide in symptoms?

 

I'm hoping I get a better report today when I pick him up, but I'm not holding my breath!!

[kim]

airial95,

 

I know Buster and EAmom's daughter had an exacerbation with 5th's. Hopefully one of them will be along with some info for you.

[thereishope]

Some people have said that their child will experience an increase in PANDAS symptoms whenever someone in the house is sick, not only with strep.

 

So, just because you see an increase in symptoms doesn't mean he has 5th's, but......be very watchful. Sometimes the PANDAS child's PANDAS symptoms will surface before you see the physical symptoms of viruses and other infections. I hate saying it, but you just may be in wait and see mode right now.

 

Try to keep them away from each for now if you can.

[dcmom]

Most likely there are two options:

 

He may be reacting to being around someone who is sick. My dd reacts when she is around strep (but I swear one time she seemed to have some very minor issues when my dh had a bad cold). Typically, if she does not get sick herself, it is a milder onset, and clears up within a few days of removing the exposure.

 

If he is getting sick, it could cause another episode unfortunately.

 

Either way, I would keep him on the full strength zithromax for now. Wait and see (which is SO hard). If it really seems like he is spiraling into another episode, wait a few days, and then I would see if you could get your ped to do a month long steroid burst (assuming the abx are not working). The steroid burst REALLY helped my dd after she started going into an episode post flu.

 

Hang in there...

[EAMom]

Yes, our dd had an exacerbation with fifth's...although it wasn't as bad as with strep, or H1N1.

 

Fifth's was also a trigger for Peggysue's dd.

 

But, like the others have said, if you're not sure if your son has it himself, it's possible he's reacting to something else. Watch and wait and keep up the Azith.

 

Note: according to this, your dd shouldn't be contagious by the time the rash appears. http://www.medicinenet.com/fifth_disease/article.htm

 

The illness classically begins with a low-grade fever and malaise (a sense of not feeling well). After about a week, this is followed by a characteristic bright red rash on the cheeks (the so called "slapped cheeks" rash). Finally, after three to four days, a fine, red, lacelike rash can develop over the rest of the body. This rash may last for five days to a week and occasionally comes and goes for up to three weeks. The other symptoms are usually gone by the time the rash appears, and patients with the rash are usually not contagious.

 

When my dd had fifth's, she did have a fever for about a day, and then pandas symptoms showed up after that, then the rash, so realized it was fifth's. It's possible your son has already gone through the period of "malaise" and the rash is coming next week...hence the pandas symptoms.

[nevergiveup]

For all those parents with a fifths disease correlation, Dr. Murphy, mentioned to me about the high ana associated with this illness and the lupus like symptoms which my daughter had after fifths disease. My dd had it twice , very unlikely but she had two bad cases of it which may have caused her extremely high ana and lupus like symptoms of cns symptoms of ocd and tics. Something that was just brought to my attention years after her illness. Of course my dd has an immune def which may have been the cause of the reaction, but if you look up fifths it has a correlation to high ana, autoimmune disease and even mental illness.

[airial95]

Thanks everyone!!! Our pediatrician said that my daughter was still contagious for a couple of days after rash, so we've kept her out of school and away from her brother as much as possible. He had a horrible morning yesterday, but after nap seemed to be much better. Had some struggles this morning getting him ready for school but we're keeping our fingers crossed that it was just a minor setback because of his sister being sick!!