Gardeners Beware

mlmccauley

mlmccauley

Cathlete
Just a friendly PSA to remind you to wear gloves – and perhaps a mask – while you are gardening. My father LOVES to garden. Every year his garden gets bigger. A few weeks ago he was working in the garden on his knees for too long and when he got up he was experiencing extreme knee pain. We thought for sure he tore his meniscus or perhaps his ACL. What started out as a knee injury, one x-ray and MRI later turned into a cancer scare when a mass was found in his knee. In the meantime, he was having issues with dehydration, shortness of breath and weakness from not eating - which we thought had to do with a bout of depression or anxiety from the “knee injury” - so we brought him to the ER. Turns out he has a fungal lung infection – Blastomycosis – also known as Gilchrist or the Chicago disease (because it is prevalent in the Midwest and surrounding areas). Preliminary results from a biopsy performed on his knee shows that the fungus is also growing in his knee too but they sent it to the lab to be certain it isn’t cancer. Hopefully results will be back today or tomorrow. He is on oxygen and still having trouble breathing but the lung infection is starting to clear up. After that he needs to start physical therapy to regain his all-over strength and for his legs and knees. Prayers and healing thoughts are welcome, but with gardening season in full-swing, I thought I would put it out there for everyone to be aware of and stay safe.

Maria
 
Oh my gosh!!! That is horrible. I hope everything works out okay. I love to garden with bare hands but I rarely if ever use chemicals, . . sometimes neem oil for my roses. Keep us posted.
 
Sorry to hear about your Dad's illness. I am a medical technologist, and we study this fungus in mycology class. You Dad's immune system might be suppressed (like in a lot of older folks), and that's how he got it. It's hard to catch unless you have lowered immunity. Histoplasma is another that falls into this category. Hope he gets well soon.
 
I wish your father lots of healing energy and prayers, I hope he feels better soon. Thanks for the heads up, I would not have thought of that on my own. I work in the garden all the time. Thats where I got my bacterial infection that lead me into an auto-immune response and subsequent gluten intolerance (weird right?) My body was convinced that anything foreign was an invader so it attacked everything, including me.

Alisha
 
Thanks everyone. From what I understand it will be a long process, he is going to be on anti-fungal medication for 6 months to a year. Physical therapy is going well so far. They are just having a more difficult time everytime they try to wean him of the oxygen - but that may be due to his 40+ years of smoking...

Thanks again for all the healing thoughts.

Maria
 
RapidBreath said:
I wish your father lots of healing energy and prayers, I hope he feels better soon. Thanks for the heads up, I would not have thought of that on my own. I work in the garden all the time. Thats where I got my bacterial infection that lead me into an auto-immune response and subsequent gluten intolerance (weird right?) My body was convinced that anything foreign was an invader so it attacked everything, including me.

Alisha
Click to expand...

Alisha,

Isn't it bizarre? Who'd a thunk it?

Maria
 
This is almost too weird. I have to go back into my doctor for a chest xray because they had an incidental finding of a granuloma in my lung. I had to have an xray done to see what was going on with my hip (turns out my muscles in my....butt are pinching it) and I get a call back with this! My research shows most of these are from some sort of fungal infection in the lungs that leaves scarring. We did tear out our deck recently, so maybe that's what did it. Can't think of anything else and won't know till my appt next week. I'm glad they caught this for your dad and I hope he starts feeling better quickly. Best wishes for a speedy recovery!

Shelby
 
You can get the infection from churned up earth.

From MayoClinic's website about one type of infection:
Histoplasmosis is an infection transmitted by airborne spores that you breathe in when you work in or around soil that contains a fungus called Histoplasma capsulatum. It generally affects your lungs, but may spread to other organs or tissues outside your lungs.

Farmers, landscapers, construction workers and people who have contact with bird or bat droppings are especially at risk of histoplasmosis.
 
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