I was 32, lean, quite healthy. But I experienced chronic canker sores. So a dermatologist decided to give me a series of weekly cowpox dosages to "perk up" my immune system. She gave me a single-dose injection on one friday, a double dose the second friday, a 3x dose on the third friday, then a 4x dose, 5x dose, 6x dose. She said I might develop a small fever over the weekend, and I did. Then came a 7x dose, and on the eighth week an 8x dose. Do the math, and that's 36 doses so far.
Then I suddenly began to hemorrhage blood like crazy. I was taken to the hospital, but no anti-inflammatory, nothing could stop it. Finally after three months in the hospital in which I lost close to 50 pounds my colon began to rupture and to save my life they cut it out and installed a bag on my side. Not fun, but it stopped the blood loss and enabled me to absorb food again.
They had left the last foot of the colon in place when they conducted the surgery, so a year later my brilliant surgeon was able to conduct a resection and sew me back together again. I still have what is now identified as Crohn's disease, but it has been manageable and in recent years, with remicade, it no longer has such an impact on my life. All in all I'm still alive, and I've been lucky.
What I've always wondered, however, was about the treatment protocol that I was given in the first place. What was the relationship of my collapse to the concurrent injection of 36 doses of cowpox vaccine? No doctor at the time was very interested in explaining it to me. Was there any precedent for it, or did the dermatologist just decide to experiment with my immune system and my life?
Then I suddenly began to hemorrhage blood like crazy. I was taken to the hospital, but no anti-inflammatory, nothing could stop it. Finally after three months in the hospital in which I lost close to 50 pounds my colon began to rupture and to save my life they cut it out and installed a bag on my side. Not fun, but it stopped the blood loss and enabled me to absorb food again.
They had left the last foot of the colon in place when they conducted the surgery, so a year later my brilliant surgeon was able to conduct a resection and sew me back together again. I still have what is now identified as Crohn's disease, but it has been manageable and in recent years, with remicade, it no longer has such an impact on my life. All in all I'm still alive, and I've been lucky.
What I've always wondered, however, was about the treatment protocol that I was given in the first place. What was the relationship of my collapse to the concurrent injection of 36 doses of cowpox vaccine? No doctor at the time was very interested in explaining it to me. Was there any precedent for it, or did the dermatologist just decide to experiment with my immune system and my life?