Risk of Bacterial Meningitis and Death in Children with Cochlear Implants

:lol: I was thinkin' the same thing when I first read in Cloggy's posts in another thread. He finally is learnin' somethin'. :giggle:
 
jillio said:
Guess not....you didn't. And flu and meningitis prsent differently symptomatically.
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Actually - to the medical community sometimes the symptoms are so close-linked they make mistakes. I'm a perfect example - when I had bacterial meningitis when I was a child, my family doctor was out of town. The guy I had to see told my Mom that I had the flu and to take me back home. Mom managed to track down our family doctor and called him because my fever kept going up and I started getting delirious. That was an extra 12 hours that I could have been treated/on antibiotics/whatever that was missed. I lapsed into a coma (that lasted 3 weeks) while in the ambulance taking me to the hospital 100 miles away.

So I just wanted to point out - even doctors can mistake the symptoms of meningitis during its onset.
 
neecy said:
Actually - to the medical community sometimes the symptoms are so close-linked they make mistakes. I'm a perfect example - when I had bacterial meningitis when I was a child, my family doctor was out of town. The guy I had to see told my Mom that I had the flu and to take me back home. Mom managed to track down our family doctor and called him because my fever kept going up and I started getting delirious. That was an extra 12 hours that I could have been treated/on antibiotics/whatever that was missed. I lapsed into a coma (that lasted 3 weeks) while in the ambulance taking me to the hospital 100 miles away.

So I just wanted to point out - even doctors can mistake the symptoms of meningitis during its onset.
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In first 24-48 hours the symtoms are similar, but quickly progress to the point that differentiation is possible. However, if one ahs a child that for any reason is more suceptible to bacterial meningitis, one should be suspicious of any flu-like symptoms.
 
jillio said:
In first 24-48 hours the symtoms are similar, but quickly progress to the point that differentiation is possible. However, if one ahs a child that for any reason is more suceptible to bacterial meningitis, one should be suspicious of any flu-like symptoms.
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Didn't I just say that.....?????
So, awarenes among the parents of these children is much higher than that of other parents. For the latter, a flue is just a flue. For the firts, a flue could be menigitis..
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Oh, sorry. Forgot the word "symptoms"... silly me...
 
Cloggy said:
Didn't I just say that.....?????

Oh, sorry. Forgot the word "symptoms"... silly me...
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Nope, that's not what you said. Symptoms is the key word. And, I said "should be", you said "is".
 
jillio said:
A flu is not meningitis. A flu is caused by virus, bacterial meningits is caused by a bacteria.
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I also like to point out another fact that confusing to some parents. To protect or vaccine someone from possible bacterial meningitis that could come from a cochlear implantation. You take the pneumococcal vaccine, not the meningitis vaccine which protects against other forms of meningitis that usually has no bearing if you have a cochlear implant or not. This was confusing to some and you may think that you need both, but several doctors have told patients that you usually only need the pneumococcal vaccine to protect against the one usually type of bacterial that could come from a cochlear implantation.
 
john57 said:
I also like to point out another fact that confusing to some parents. To protect or vaccine someone from possible bacterial meningitis that could come from a cochlear implantation. You take the pneumococcal vaccine, not the meningitis vaccine which protects against other forms of meningitis that usually has no bearing if you have a cochlear implant or not. This was confusing to some and you may think that you need both, but several doctors have told patients that you usually only need the pneumococcal vaccine to protect against the one usually type of bacterial that could come from a cochlear implantation.
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Exactly. And then there is also the confusion that arises between the difference between viral pneumonia, bacterial pneumonia, bacterial menigitis, and viral meningitis.
 
Cloggy said:
CI-users in the article: 29/4264=0.0068 or 0.68%

Worldwide ocurance:for children (from general article..)

Using 16.8/100000= 0.000168 or 0.0168%. So it's quite a difference from this point of view. A factor 40.

But as said, there is higher occurance when someone becomes deaf due to menigitis.
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Thanks for clarifying that Cloggy. Not sure where the 7% came from and what a relief that it's not as high as that and this would put it closer into line with the British study that I mentioned. I'd say that 0.017% is a relatively small risk really. To put it in perspective, it's about the same as the chance of a woman dying in natural childbirth in a first world country.
 
jillio said:
Nope, that's not what you said. Symptoms is the key word. And, I said "should be", you said "is".
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Picky picky picky.....

What's up with you? ..... oh, is that the problem... it happens....
 
You guys are going in circles with your arguments, and many of you are resorting to petty personal attacks, which really don't serve you or your arguments well at all.

I think we all might be able to agree that ALL parents (or, at least all parents here) want what is best for their children. The problem we're running into with these discussions about cochlear implants is that for each family, the definition of "best" is different, sometimes vastly different. No one wants to think that the choices they make for their children are the WRONG choices, and so when we have such a controversial topic such as this, where each "side" is convinced that the decisions they've made are THE right decisions... it's going to be impossible NOT to take these differences of opinion personally.

For the sake of harmony/unity here on these boards, you guys are going to have to come to SOME kind of acceptance that your adversaries on the other side of this argument are NOT going to change their minds, and are doing what they think is best for their children.

As far as this particular argument about bacterial meningitis goes... some of you see the 0.017% risk as an acceptable risk. Some of you see ONE death as one death too many. I don't think either side is going to convince the other on this. Personally, I see it as similar to plane crashes... we know that there are hundreds or thousands of flights taking place each day. And if there are three crashes in the same week, it's going to receive a lot of media coverage, and a lot of people are going to shy away from air travel as a result. Other people will continue to see the risk as a small one, and continue to travel. Again, it's a personal decision.

As an outsider looking in, I can tell you that it is evident that ALL of you care for your children, and are only concerned with doing what you think is in their best interest. (Or, for those of you adults who've chosen to be implanted yourselves, you've chosen to do what you think is in YOUR best interest.) I think this is going to have to be one of those arguments where there isn't a RIGHT or WRONG final answer... but rather, a right answer for YOU or for your children. And personally, I think we'd do better to just accept whatever those decisions are, and not attempt to demonize those decisions on the other "side" of the argument.
 
Cloggy said:
Picky picky picky.....

What's up with you? ..... oh, is that the problem... it happens....
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Hey, you're the one that keeps talking about making sure the information is correct. Then make it correct, cloggy.
 
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