How do you know if you have c-diff?

My colitis has been in remission since I started on Remicade. I am due for my next infusion in 10 days but I bumped up the appt to next Tuesday because I started having blood and frequency yesterday.
Today I've been to the bathroom 20 times, each time with blood. I have terrible stomach pain and a 102 fever. I've been taking antibiotics for strep and a sinus infection for about 17 days.

Of course I always get sick on Friday! I have a call into my GI but he hasn't called me back! Does anyone have an experience like this?

the blood test would only state if there are high white blood counts, not that a specific infection of c.difficile is present.

I believe stool samples are the only way to determine the exact bacteria.

q

oh wow, i had c-diff one time and it is NOT fun!!! when i had it, my temp got up to 105 degrees and i was completely fatigued and couldn't keep any food or drink down. I finally went to the hospital and had to stay for about 2-3 days and i had to be quarantined because of the bacteria...do you have it?

Well my doctor told me to go to urgent care last night. After going to the bathroom 21 times before urgent care, I could only squeeze out about 15 drops - which they said was enough to get the culture done which they said is negative for c-diff. this seems much worse than my colitis and my doctor said I'd have to be tested for c-diff first because I shouldn't get Remicade if I had c-diff and I'm due for my Remicade on Tuesday. Does anyone know if c-diff would change your cbc? Ever since I started on Remicade in May I've been in complete remission then suddenly literally overnight I have the worst colitis ever! They weren't going to give me anything in urgent care but I made them call my GI and he prescribed Flagyl.

Has anyone ever had their colitiis come back more violently than before less than 2 weeks before they are due for Remicade?

I get remicade infusions every eight weeks and two weeks before i am due for one I always start to bleed/have a bit of a flare up. The remicade always makes everything go back to normal. My doctor says i can get it every six weeks but I am afraid that i will start to flare up two weeks earlier and then there is nothing else I can do, so for those two weeks I usually just stick it out and try to relax and may take an enema a few times before the next remicade infusion.

glamourgirl said...
Typically 2 stool tests are done because they can have false negatives. Also, they need to test for both toxin A & B in both samples. I would ask for a second test just to be sure. It seems odd that your symptoms would change overnight like that. Going 20 times a day, sounds exactly like how c. diff is for me.

That is what it seems like to me. This is like sudden onset of my worst day of colitis ever. It usually doesn't happen so severe just overnight like this. I stopped eating on Friday because the abdominal pain is too severe and the frequency was killing me. Today I don't have a fever but I did take the liberty of putting myself on 30mg of prednisone yesterday, 20mg today and I have the flagyl. This just seems odd to me. I hope the Remicade resolves everything right away. I'm only concerned that they possibly didn't have enough stool to test.