Yesterday I had my appointment with the oral surgeon.
After explaining my medical history and my fears with him, the doctor did a thorough exam of my mouth, tongue and throat and declared that there was absolutely nothing abnormal nor unusual growing in or on them...basically a clean bill of health.
Clean bill of health....those beautiful sounding words...like music to my ears especially after listening to quite a number of off key notes over the past few years.
The plan is that I come back in June and then have regular checkups every 6 months or so.
So it appears that I did have strep throat after all...even though the basic strep throat test turned up negative.
I really don't mind falling into that 20% margin of error that this strep test has a history of being wrong...actually I welcome it.
The alternative could have been a lot worse...like those off key notes of the past.
My Hopes May Have Come True
I have been taking an antibiotic for the last 4 days. My doctor prescribed it for me, even though the strep test that they gave me turned out to be negative.
It is beginning to look like I might have been in that 20% margin of error that the basic strep test has accumulated.
I am feeling better plus those whitish dots on my Uvula and off to the side of it....they are all gone.
Just to be on the safe side, I have an appointment with an oral surgeon. I will go in this upcoming Monday and let him do some in depth checking in my mouth and throat.
I am starting to feel a little more at ease with this situation.
And what is equally as exciting as me having had strep is that in just 14 days, Veronica and I head to Alaska!!!!
I wanted to thank everyone for their well wishes. It is greatly appreciated.
It is beginning to look like I might have been in that 20% margin of error that the basic strep test has accumulated.
I am feeling better plus those whitish dots on my Uvula and off to the side of it....they are all gone.
Just to be on the safe side, I have an appointment with an oral surgeon. I will go in this upcoming Monday and let him do some in depth checking in my mouth and throat.
I am starting to feel a little more at ease with this situation.
And what is equally as exciting as me having had strep is that in just 14 days, Veronica and I head to Alaska!!!!
I wanted to thank everyone for their well wishes. It is greatly appreciated.
Hoping For Strep Throat
I realize that the title to this blog entry might seem kind of silly.
Who in the world would wish or hope for strep throat.
That is me sitting in the back of the room, waving my arm to and fro, yelling....I do......I do.....I do.....gimme....gimme...gimme!!!!
That is because a couple of years ago I ended up with Leukoplakia on my tongue.
The reason for me having such a condition was because I had been a smoker for 30 plus years. Please note that "had" is a very key word to that sentence...I have now been smoke free for almost 2 years.
For those of you that followed my blog back then, I wrote about what I was going through with my initial discovery, the biopsy and subsequent surgery that I had on my tongue. I also wrote about how that one event had me living in fear and paranoia every time something shows up in my mouth or throat area.
About 6 nights ago, I woke up with a very dry mouth. Not only was my mouth dry but my Uvula...the flappy dangly thing at the back of your mouth, was sore, which I figured was from my mouth being so dry.
Before I continue....who comes up with words like Uvula to give that flappy dangly thing its name...geesh...is that the best they could do?
Moving on...I ended up waking up a total of 3 times that night to the same dry mouth and sore Uvula.
The next day it was sore but I did not really give it much thought.
As the days went on, the soreness continued, my right ear kind of hurt just a little and it hurt to swallow...not from my throat but from my Uvula. I also noticed that my throat had been feeling kind of dry but with a bad allergy season upon us, I figured that it was from all of the junk in the air.
I had Veronica use a flashlight and take a look.
There on my right side of my Uvula was a whitish round dot. This dot isn't right on the flappy dangling thing but on the skin that attaches the Uvula to the side of my throat/back of my mouth.
At first Veronica thought that it was a blister but upon further inspection by the both of us, it wasn't a blister...just some sort of white dot. I thought that I also saw some other kind of white dots off to the back my right cheek...near the jaw bone area.
I had also been experiencing on and off headaches for a day or so but no coughing or sneezing or anything else that would indicate a cold.
I decided that it was time visit a doctor.
Being new to the area, it was not so easy to find a doctor that would take new patients and become my "primary physician" while I am living here.
I did finally locate one and yesterday I went to my doctors visit.
The doctors assistant took a swabbing of the back of my mouth and tongue and ran a strep test on it while I was there.
After a bit the doctor came in and told me that the strep test came back negative but that:
1) strep was going around the area quite a bit
2) that because I had taken a couple of doses of amoxicillin the previous day, that it might have caused the negative reading. I also read that there is about a 20% chance of errors in the outcome of those strep tests...as far as a false negative goes.
I was so hoping that it would turn out positive and that I would have strep throat.
The doctor and I decided to go ahead and treat it as if it was strep throat and return to see what it looked like and how I felt after the antibiotics were completely taken.
We also decided that no matter how my mouth looked, I would be referred to an oral surgeon and let him have a good look at my mouth and throat, just to make sure that there is nothing else going on.
Of course if the antibiotics don't clear up whatever it is that I currently have, the oral surgeon could play a bigger part in all of this.
But for now, I am in a holding pattern to see if I can't get rid of this via the antibiotics.
Even though the strep test turned out negative, I am still the one sitting in the back of the room, arm waving to and fro...yelling....I want strep....I want strep!!!
Who in the world would wish or hope for strep throat.
That is me sitting in the back of the room, waving my arm to and fro, yelling....I do......I do.....I do.....gimme....gimme...gimme!!!!
That is because a couple of years ago I ended up with Leukoplakia on my tongue.
The reason for me having such a condition was because I had been a smoker for 30 plus years. Please note that "had" is a very key word to that sentence...I have now been smoke free for almost 2 years.
For those of you that followed my blog back then, I wrote about what I was going through with my initial discovery, the biopsy and subsequent surgery that I had on my tongue. I also wrote about how that one event had me living in fear and paranoia every time something shows up in my mouth or throat area.
About 6 nights ago, I woke up with a very dry mouth. Not only was my mouth dry but my Uvula...the flappy dangly thing at the back of your mouth, was sore, which I figured was from my mouth being so dry.
Before I continue....who comes up with words like Uvula to give that flappy dangly thing its name...geesh...is that the best they could do?
Moving on...I ended up waking up a total of 3 times that night to the same dry mouth and sore Uvula.
The next day it was sore but I did not really give it much thought.
As the days went on, the soreness continued, my right ear kind of hurt just a little and it hurt to swallow...not from my throat but from my Uvula. I also noticed that my throat had been feeling kind of dry but with a bad allergy season upon us, I figured that it was from all of the junk in the air.
I had Veronica use a flashlight and take a look.
There on my right side of my Uvula was a whitish round dot. This dot isn't right on the flappy dangling thing but on the skin that attaches the Uvula to the side of my throat/back of my mouth.
At first Veronica thought that it was a blister but upon further inspection by the both of us, it wasn't a blister...just some sort of white dot. I thought that I also saw some other kind of white dots off to the back my right cheek...near the jaw bone area.
I had also been experiencing on and off headaches for a day or so but no coughing or sneezing or anything else that would indicate a cold.
I decided that it was time visit a doctor.
Being new to the area, it was not so easy to find a doctor that would take new patients and become my "primary physician" while I am living here.
I did finally locate one and yesterday I went to my doctors visit.
The doctors assistant took a swabbing of the back of my mouth and tongue and ran a strep test on it while I was there.
After a bit the doctor came in and told me that the strep test came back negative but that:
1) strep was going around the area quite a bit
2) that because I had taken a couple of doses of amoxicillin the previous day, that it might have caused the negative reading. I also read that there is about a 20% chance of errors in the outcome of those strep tests...as far as a false negative goes.
I was so hoping that it would turn out positive and that I would have strep throat.
The doctor and I decided to go ahead and treat it as if it was strep throat and return to see what it looked like and how I felt after the antibiotics were completely taken.
We also decided that no matter how my mouth looked, I would be referred to an oral surgeon and let him have a good look at my mouth and throat, just to make sure that there is nothing else going on.
Of course if the antibiotics don't clear up whatever it is that I currently have, the oral surgeon could play a bigger part in all of this.
But for now, I am in a holding pattern to see if I can't get rid of this via the antibiotics.
Even though the strep test turned out negative, I am still the one sitting in the back of the room, arm waving to and fro...yelling....I want strep....I want strep!!!
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