walking pneumonia

[Lones Green]

so i have this for the 2nd time in 3 years, from something called microplasm. i've yet to research this, due to my laziness. at least i can still keep my diet in check, and im not throwing up. anyone had this?

[the doc]

mycoplasma pneumoniae - takes a while to recover from that.

[Lones Green]

mycoplasma pneumoniae - takes a while to recover from that.

god yes. last time i had it, i was coughing up stuff for about 6 weeks. looks like im taking quite a bit of time off, and keeping my diet in check. i needed to take time off anyway, so im not too discouraged. i have antibiotics, and from research all i can understand is its a very small genome, bacterial infection...lacking a cell wall? weird.

[ectx]

wow, your doc actually diagnosed you with M. pneumonia. It's not the most common cause of pneumonia but it definitely sucks. The problem is that the bacteria are harder to get rid of and when they do they leave irritants in your lungs that hang out for a while and can keep you coughing and congested for up to a month, long after the infection is gone. Mycoplasma trivia for joo: they're the smallest elf-replicating pathogen known to man. E. coli and salmonella have about 8 times as much genetic material. LOL...sorry, not trying to show off, just think these bugs are cool.

[the doc]

yes they used to think they were a virus right?

AFAIK, you need a chest X-ray or culture for conclusive dx

[ectx]

yes they used to think they were a virus right?

AFAIK, you need a chest X-ray or culture for conclusive dx

Yeah, they did. Mycoplasmas can sneak through bacterial retaining cultures. so they'd filter out what they thought was all bacteria and still have something pathogenic. It also required another cell to grow from culture. So, essentially it looked like a virus to the guys growing it up. There's no real animal model for it though. There's an organ tissue model (hamster tracheal ring) and a chick embryo model but nothing clear-cut and well established. Couple that with a lack of a clearly defined genetic system and different codons (UGA=tryptophan...try making copies of its genes in E. coli when you have to switch a gazillion tryptophans to not be read as stops by E. coli) and you have every grad student's nightmare. It's still a very cool bug. It always surprised me that something so streamlined could make someone so sick. I guess it shouldn't. Viruses get by on a lot less.

[the doc]

yeah the other thing i learned was that it grows slow as hell and thus ribosomal anti-bs (the only ones i know to work) are pretty much useless although they are the DOC (fluoroquinolones and macrolides)

[the doc]

another trivia note... its called walking pneumonia because the patient looks sick as hell, has diffuse infiltrate all over the PA radiograph, and somehow still manages to walk in your office and say " i dont feel so good"

[ectx]

yeah, it does. That also made it a nighmare to work with. It took about a week to grow. Keep in mind that these are lab strains that were suppose to be adapted to the media and to more rapid growth. Whereas our coleagues working on E. coli, salmonella, and cholera could run several experiments in a day or two, we were still growing the darn things. The media was crazy too. We had to use CMRL, yeast extract, glucose, and fetal bovine serum. The lots of FBS had to be tested as not all of them were good to grow the bugs in. We also had to use flat tissue culture flasks. The bacteria grew in a film on the bottom of the flask and to harvest them we had to wipe them off. Within 3 months, depite working under a hood, when you'd work in the lab you'd come down with an M. pneumoniae infection.

[ectx]

btw, do they still teach you guys to do a cold agluttination test for diagnosis?

[the doc]

yeah we talk about it but it is still BS since it is incredibly nonspecific and anti-bs dont develop until the infection is well underway...lol. However, it is better than nothing

[Lones Green]

wow, this stuff is way over my head. good to read though. i got a Z-pack from the doc yesterday and i'm starting to clear up a little bit.

[Alex.V]

Somebody get a hose for these two.