Saturday 11/29/08 Medical update

-Spinal tap #3 preliminary results are in. Only showing 2 white blood cells. This is down from 81 (spinal tap #1) and 70 (spinal tap #2)

- Sue has slightly more mobility in her arms.

- Sue continues to have focal seizures. Occasionally these focal seizures seem to rattle her. Some of them seem stronger. They do not hurt her but they seem to cause her some distress.

- I thought doctors orders were to take her off of Versad, but she is still on it. This is probably good since seizures are still occurring.

- Not sure how long she can stay intubated without needing a tracheotomy.

Powassan virus?

I hope thing are going well today. I was just brushing up on my viral encephalitides and paraneoplastic syndromes. I came across this helpful summary article on viral encephalitis-- which it still sounds most likely to be. I found a virus that sounds like a possible cause: Powassan, an arbovirus caused by a tickbite. I'm wondering if this was tested for, or if it could be tested for??

Most of the others on this table sound relatively unlikely-- not in the right part of the world, wrong time of year, wrong symptom complex, etc. http://www.emedicine.com/neuro/topic393.htm

The more I read about the neuro paraneoplastic syndromes, the less likely it sounds. Limbic encephalitis is one of those-- 60% of people who have it have an underlying cancer. Its features do not sound consistent with what Susan has, from what I've read.