HELP! Noone knows what's wrong with my child

[lam38]

HELP! Noone knows what's wrong with my child



About two months ago my 6 year old son began complaining of headaches and then his lymphnodes swelled in the back of his head.  I took him to the doctor and they said it was a virus.  The next day I was back at the doctor's office because overnight, he broke out into an all over body rash.  They told me it was scarlett fever, even though 2 strep tests came back negative.  They gave him amoxicillin.  He continued with the rash getting worse, a temp of 104 for a few days.  I kept taking him back to his pediatrician and finally they put him on a steroid and antihistamine.  It helped with the rash but after he was tapered off everything came back but worse.  This time he had to go to the hospital and stay overnight because his arms swelled up and puss started oozing from them.  They treated him with steroids again and tested him for EBV virus.  It was negative.  Again, once he tapered off the steroid, the rash came back.  This time my pediatrician sent us to a dermatologist who took a biopsy from his arm.  This came back with showing signs of contact dermatitis, possible drug reaction, etc.  Nothing specific.  He is now tapering off the steroids and I am afraid it will return again.  NOONE knows what is wrong with my son.  Even the IDS doctors at University of KY hospital could give us answers.  As a matter of fact, they used my son as a study for the interns and med students because "they had never seen anything like it".  Noone has told me what my next step is.  We are just in limbo.  Has anyone heard of this before?  My son has gained alot of weight and is swollen from the steroids.  His temperment has completely changed and is very agressive.  Please help.  Have pictures if needed.

[wishforchange]

The word that was asterisked out was probably considered a swear word!  Read the initials of each of these following words and you will see the word, and sorry, I didn't realise how they system would read the word.  Here are the initials - Pretty Red Individual Cloudy Kitten.  It really wasn't intende as a bad word, just a description of the test.  All the best

[wishforchange]

I'm sorry to hear of your son's problems.  It sounds like the doctors are working hard trying to identify the cause.  Two things you haven't mentioned are whether he has had an autoimmune profile done  - a blood test - as this may be a cause?  Also did the dermatologist do a full skin ***** test to look for allergic responses from various items?  It does sound very much like some sort of allergy.  Double check this with your doctors. If you feel they are completely stumped for answers, maybe research for specialist paediatricians in your area.  I'm sure the hospital is doing what they can, but maybe you would also like to protect your little boy from too much attention from interns etc. learning about an interesting case.  It may be a bit overwhelming for him to have too many people questioning and examinining him, and if he is going to be in hospital a while you need to ensure his needs are always being put first, ahead of any learning opportunity for students.  I'm sure they're being sensitive but I also think how unerving it could be to have groups of grown ups coming and staring at him a lot.  Stay confident and stay on top of knowing what is being done and why.  Hope he makes a full and speedy recovery.