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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 22 of 22. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by AMD on June 25, 2005, at 15:26:55
Folks,
The last time I did cocaine was with a group of four other people, mostly clean-cut but definite partyers. We were sharing a straw. After I had done a line I removed the straw from my nose and noticed the tip had a bit of blood on it, as if it had contacted some irritated, bloodied skin and the blood had smeared the end of the straw.
Now I'm worried I may have contacted a disease from one of the other people from my apparently open wound.
I know HCV is theoretically transmittable this way, but what about other diseases? Staph, for example. I found some articles stating that it is "highly likely" to be infected with staph via an open wound this way as most of the bacteria collects in the noses of people. So now I'm worried I'm going to get boils on my skin soon or be disfigured, or something. And then there's HCV, I mentioned.
Ugh! I'm freaking out! I have an image of having snorted up every disease known to man via this exposed route.
(My nose wasn't gushing, at least. But if I, say, stick a tissue up it there will be a tiny blotch of red from where it hits high up in my nasal cavity. This has remained for a couple weeks.)
Is it likely I will have picked up something that will make me very sick or chronically ill via this exposure? Am I making too much of this?
amd
Posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 14:37:41
In reply to Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by AMD on June 25, 2005, at 15:26:55
I am seriously freaking out now ... did I just open the door to all kinds of diseases? How soon would I know if I'd contracted something?
amd
Posted by rainbowbrite on June 26, 2005, at 15:11:57
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 14:37:41
>Is it likely I will have picked up something that will make me very sick or chronically ill via this exposure?
Im almost positive you will be fine. I think you should go to a doctor and get checked out though.
>Am I making too much of this?
No, if I was using all the things you were using I would probably be freaking out as well. But I wish you would make more of what you are putting yourself through each time you mess around with drugs.
I think you have probably read way too much into it. We can probably diagnose ourselves with many diseases out there byt the checklists available.Listen....important thought/question.....how many times have you actually contracted something, had a medical problem caused by your druguse that you have posted concerns about? Im being serious....has it ever ever turned out that you were not being paranoid or freaking out for good reason?
Take care, and try to stay away from that crap, not just peoples germs :-)
rain
Posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 15:31:13
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine) » AMD, posted by rainbowbrite on June 26, 2005, at 15:11:57
I certainly hope I'll be OK because I am having a nervous breakdown.
Thanks for your advice.
amd
Posted by calamityjane on June 26, 2005, at 16:01:34
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 15:31:13
AMD--
I have done stuff and then later been freaking out exactly like you are right now. And in the end all my freaking out caused me much more harm than the original "risky" behavior to begin with. Yeah, you MIGHT have put yourself at risk but IMO the chances are not high. Dont be too scared to go to the doc though b/c IF (and that is a big IF) you happened to catch something then you need to know ASAP. The sooner the better. If you leave it up to chance then you are causing a much greater risk to your health.And I hope this taught you a HUGE lesson that drugs really are not worth it. Was that one little high worth all this worry? Not to be a mommy to ya but please use this as a learning experience!!!
Posted by rainbowbrite on June 26, 2005, at 16:04:10
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 15:31:13
aww i know that feeling. I really really think you should go to a doc.
But, I also really think you will be ok. the chances of catching something are so so slim....you know?try to relax, its hard to do i know, I cant do it myself. Maybe focus on something else? Can you get out or do something? DISTRACT my favorite new word :-)
take it easy
rain
Posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 16:11:04
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine) » AMD, posted by rainbowbrite on June 26, 2005, at 16:04:10
I'll try to relax ... I guess I focus on the fear that I could have caught who knows how many things. Obviously HCV is a worry, and probably the biggest one, although from what I read there is little real evidence it's transmitted this way. And there this is staph. But assuming I'm clear of those -- a big "if," but I've got my fingers crossed -- what about the zillion other things?
There is no way I would ever survive as a health-care worker. If I ever got accidentally stuck with a needle I'd be anxiety-ridden for life!
So what happened, I think, is that I had some exposed tissue (thus blood) high up my nose, and my straw happened to come in touch with it. I then switched to my own device. But I am worried that whatever muccus or shedding from other folks had contaminated the straw before then might have entered my bloodstream. I don't know enough about how this actually works to be able to say for sure the possibility either way.
amd
Posted by calamityjane on June 26, 2005, at 16:27:33
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 16:11:04
AMD you sound JUST like me!!!
I think instead of being treated for an infection you need to get some anxiety treatment. I think you were involved in a topic on here a couple of months ago when we were all talking about searching the internet for hours trying to diagnose ourselves with some awful deadly disease! Or going to the library looking for self-diagnosis books. Its very common to have anxiety but if you dont get some help for it then this is what happens. You loose out on your life by worrying about all the awful "maybes".
Dont worry, I am almost SURE that you are going to turn out ok and that you didnt contract anything from your experience.On another note, have you seen the movie "Almost Famous"? Theres a line in it that I always remember...its really simple...its when the mom drops off her son to a concert. She honks the horn and yells really loud to him in front of a huge crowd....she says to him::
DONT DO DRUGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 16:33:46
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by calamityjane on June 26, 2005, at 16:27:33
I wish I could remember how much I freak out after doing cocaine /right before/ I'm about to do some!
I just started Topamax, which is supposed to help with binge drinking. That's the real problem here -- when I don't drink I have control over drugs. (Well, the only drug I've ever really used is cocaine.)
I am going to try to relax, but honestly, I know I'll be having anxiety over this until I see my doctor, and perhaps even for some time after that.
amd
Posted by calamityjane on June 26, 2005, at 16:41:51
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine) » calamityjane, posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 16:33:46
AMD--
you can do it!! It can be done.....I know there is a new med coming out that is to be used for addiction...I am going to search it right now and try to remember what its called.
Posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 16:44:54
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by calamityjane on June 26, 2005, at 16:41:51
Cool. Let me know what you find. I just hope it's not too late for me. :-(
amd
Posted by calamityjane on June 26, 2005, at 16:49:27
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine) » calamityjane, posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 16:44:54
ok, I found it...
I read about this in a text required for a class I took last semester.
Its called Ibogaine and as far as I know its sort of hard to locate. I am not sure if its approved for use in the US yet, but you can look into it and see. If you have family that could help you I bet you could find a treatment facility that offers it, but probably not in our country.
I am not sure if you are addicted to opiate based substances, but let me give you one piece of advice, methadone is NOT the way to go. My aunt was on it for two years for Vicodin addiction and it has pretty much destroyed her life. She is off it now though and doing better.So, have you heard of Ibogaine? the text was several years old so you may have already heard of it.
Posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 17:15:44
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by calamityjane on June 26, 2005, at 16:49:27
I'm not really addicted to any illicit drug, particularly in the physical sense. I've never done any opiate-based drug, nor injected anything. I've done what would be considered the "upper-class" drug cocaine. It's of course just as bad as the others in its own way, but I thank God I never tried heroin or anything else.
No, my problem is alcohol: and not drinking day-to-day, but rather a two- to three-week abstinence followed by a one-night bender. It's these benders that get me in trouble.
The most recent one resulted in the experience I've recounted herein.
The interesting thing is, mentally (aside from this anxiety) I don't feel nearly as bad or depressed as I typically do following a binge. Probably because I didn't over-do it: I just drank a bit, did some lines, and then crashed. If I hadn't seen blood on the straw, I would probably have brushed it off. But ... I did see blood, and so I'm scared to death.
I'm worried I have HCV, or at the least staph, and now I'm looking at my skin every few minutes to see if there are any boils.
This is misery. I wish I could go to the emergency room or something, but historically they have been fear-mongerers that just make me more anxiety-ridden before I've had a chance to see my see my doctor.
amd
Posted by Dr. Bob on June 26, 2005, at 21:07:59
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by calamityjane on June 26, 2005, at 16:27:33
> On another note, have you seen the movie "Almost Famous"? Theres a line in it that I always remember...
I'd just like to plug the double double quotes feature at this site:
http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/faq.html#amazon
The first time anyone refers to a book, movie, or music without using this option, I post this to try to make sure he or she at least knows about it. It's just an option, though, and doesn't *have* to be used. If people *choose* not to use it, I'd be interested why not, but I'd like that redirected to Psycho-Babble Administration:
http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/admin/20020918/msgs/7717.html
Thanks!
Bob
Posted by chemist on June 27, 2005, at 0:51:18
In reply to Re: Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine) » calamityjane, posted by AMD on June 26, 2005, at 17:15:44
> I'm not really addicted to any illicit drug, particularly in the physical sense. I've never done any opiate-based drug, nor injected anything. I've done what would be considered the "upper-class" drug cocaine. It's of course just as bad as the others in its own way, but I thank God I never tried heroin or anything else.
>
> No, my problem is alcohol: and not drinking day-to-day, but rather a two- to three-week abstinence followed by a one-night bender. It's these benders that get me in trouble.
>
> The most recent one resulted in the experience I've recounted herein.
>
> The interesting thing is, mentally (aside from this anxiety) I don't feel nearly as bad or depressed as I typically do following a binge. Probably because I didn't over-do it: I just drank a bit, did some lines, and then crashed. If I hadn't seen blood on the straw, I would probably have brushed it off. But ... I did see blood, and so I'm scared to death.
>
> I'm worried I have HCV, or at the least staph, and now I'm looking at my skin every few minutes to see if there are any boils.
>
> This is misery. I wish I could go to the emergency room or something, but historically they have been fear-mongerers that just make me more anxiety-ridden before I've had a chance to see my see my doctor.
>
> amdhello there, chemist here...you should not dismiss the risks associated with exposing your intranasal region with the blood of another individual in re: hepatitis C.
before the citations, you should be aware that alcohol (i do mean ethanol, the kind humans are prone to drink) and cocaine - when used together - are metabolized to a toxic intermediate called cocaethylene. the enzyme responsible is hCE1, also implicated in the first step in metabolizing heroin to morphine, and also of interest to those of us in the nerve agent business.
interestingly, in the absence of ethanol, hCE1 does not produce the more toxic metabolite, and renal elimination of benzoylecognine is the primary route for the end-game. perhaps evolution of homo sapiens - and the various enzymes we host - is providing a hint that at the very least, cocaine and ethanol should not be used together. and the product - cocaethylene - has a longer half-life than cocaine, is more toxic, and the ratio of this metabolite found in the brain to that found in blood is greater than the analogous quantity for cocaine.
a quick look at pubmed and my files does not yield a null result for intranasal cociane use and hepatitis C viral transmission/risk/etc...the abstract for one manuscript in particular is quite striking, not to mention the title: ``Detection of hepatitis C virus in the nasal secrections of an intranasal drug-user.'' McMahon et al., Ann Clin Microbiol Antimicrob. 3 (2004). in five subjects with positive results for presence of HCV, all of them were found to test positive for the HCV RNA in their nasal secrestions.
Fuller et al. - J Urban Health 81, 20 - 24 (2004) - in the cathily-entitled pub ``Hepatitis C incidence - a comparison between injection and noninjection drug users in New York City'' = found that HCV infection took much longer in the group who did not use drugs i.v. (cocaine, the free base crack, and heroin were the drugs examined).
Galperim et al. Addiction 99, 973 - 977 (2004). ``Intranasal cocaine use does not appear to be an independent risk factor for HCV infection.'' sixty in-patients for chemical dependence were the cohort, and 15 of them tested positive for HCV (10 of the 15 had enough of a viral load for sequencing via PCR). however, the positive group did have the highest rate of i.v. drug use in addition to intranasal cocaine use.
J Addict Dis. 23, 71 - 81 (2004). Salloum et al. ``Concurrent alcohol and cocaine dependence impact on physical health among psychiatric patients.'' 38 alcohol + cocaine dependence; 38 alcohol dependence only; and 25 cocaine dependence only were examined for viral hepatitis, STDs, liver function/dysfunction, and EKG abnormalities. the alcohol + cocaine group had hihest occerrence of physical disorders and ``multiple hepatitis infections'' than the other two groups.
a study by Mijailovic et al. (Med Pregl. 56, 511 - 515 (2003)) - found that in 82 patients with viral hepatitis C (chronic), the risk factor associated with contracting the virus via intranasal administration was 2% (the lowest), with i.v. drug use at 37%.
however, hep B is also blood-borne and hep D can accompany it (two-for-one). fortunately, there are effective vaccines for hep B (hep A, too, although this should not be an issue here). no such luck for hep C. see Kuo et al. Drug Alcohol Depend. 73, 69 - 78 (2004). ``Hepatitis B infection and vaccination among young injection and non-injection drug users: missed opportunities to prevent infection.'' 200 i.v. drug users and 124 non-i.v users (all in the 15 - 30 year-old range) were examined for evidence of past hep B infection as well as past hep B vaccination. the i.v. group came up with 37% having been infected with HBV in the past, almost double the non-i.v. group (19%). in addition to sexual practices, gender, and race, missing an opportunity for vaccination was found to be true of 84% of those who had had or had HBV at the time of the study.
Koblin et al. J Med Virol. 70, 387 - 390 (2003). ``Hepatitis C virus infection among noninjecting drug users in New York City.'' age: [15,40]; duration of use: <= 10 years; n = 276. 4.7% of the cohort tested positive for HCV in sera. if heroin was added to the cocaine (also intranasal), risk was increased and determined to be independent of any other drug use or sexual behaviour of the infected.
cocaine and heroin alone are cause for hepatic impairment, via (almost exclusively) phase I (one) reactions in CYP-450; the role of cocaine in altering lipids to more toxic variations via peroxidation is also on the radar of researchers in this area.
that keywords ``cocaine,'' ``hepatitis,'' and ``new york'' yield 11 citations on pubmed - and not all are relavent to your query, naturally - ought to give a resident of New York City pause when considering accepting a bloody straw for snorting cocaine, i opine. that HIV, syphillis, unprotected sexual encounters, i.v. drug use, and HBV - to cite the more frequently-appearing - are found in concert with HCV and non-i.v. cocaine use would give one more pause, i opine (again).
new york is not alone: los angeles yields one citation; chicago, three; turning international to vancouver, seven; london, four; rome and tokyo tied with amsterdam, zero; zurich, paris, and berlin tied at one; going to nations/states australia, one; canada, five; south africa, one; united states, forty-five; and so forth. peru, bolivia, and colombia together == 0.
if you are certain that all the vectors - a fancy word for identified, specific mechanism, and chain by which the nasties are transmitted - for HIV, HBV, HCV, syphillis, and so forth are disclosed in toto to you and that not any person with whom you have now shared blood is an asymptomatic carrier of any of the above or is in early infection stages, than you ought to feel some comfort.
i suspect you are curious about incubation periods...do not let a ``negative'' result put you at ease, as the viral load for definitive results via PCR of antigens that will build in number will not reach the requisite concentration for 2 to 8 weeks, in general.
please do not make a habit of snorting blood from the nasal cavities of others into your own nasal cavities, even if you do not mean to do so during the course of snorting cocaine. it is generally regarded as an unhealthy activity.
also: please consider the other substances likely - or unlikely - found in the goods you are snorting. your dealer is likely not telling the truth in re: the purity of the cocaine or what it is cut with: this is just a guess...
more later, including ibogaine....yours, c
Posted by AMD on June 27, 2005, at 1:05:07
In reply to please read... » AMD, posted by chemist on June 27, 2005, at 0:51:18
chemist,
Do you think the damage already caused by cocaethylene will have long-term consequences? I haven't done cocaine in about a month, but I'm still worried about its long-term effects. My mood has been improving steadily, and now I'm worried that will be all moot based on your posting. I also worry about my long-term cognition, but hope that with time all of the above will recover fully.
Finally, with regard to HCV: yes, obviously, "sharing blood" is not a favorable activity (the mere thought of it makes me sick), and it was my blood on the straw, not theirs, at least. And of course this was one incident. But I will need to get tested this week and likely again in the coming months (incubation period you mentioned). The people I was with are not, as far as I know, HIV, HBV, or HCV carriers, but I suppose only time will tell for sure.
I am hoping that my prognosis is favorable, despite some of the rather disturbing studies.
amd
Posted by calamityjane on June 27, 2005, at 13:57:57
In reply to Re: double double quotes » calamityjane, posted by Dr. Bob on June 26, 2005, at 21:07:59
Cool!!
I didnt know that was possible. Thats is pretty neat. I think there are a lot more special features on the boards than I realize. I need to go read up and check them out.Thanks!
Posted by AMD on June 27, 2005, at 19:48:58
In reply to please read... » AMD, posted by chemist on June 27, 2005, at 0:51:18
Went to the doctor today, and got some blood work. I know it's too early, but at least I'll know whether I've been harboring anything.
But I'm very, very anxiety-ridden and basically feeling horrible.
btw, chemist, I took you up on your offer, but never heard back...
amd
Posted by Dr. Bob on June 27, 2005, at 21:46:58
In reply to Re: double double quotes back to Dr. Bob..., posted by calamityjane on June 27, 2005, at 13:57:57
Posted by cockeyed on July 1, 2005, at 2:32:34
In reply to Diseases spread via sharing straws (cocaine), posted by AMD on June 25, 2005, at 15:26:55
yuck. think snot. i mean phlegm or mucus. praise jesus, i've never had the opportunity to snort. you probably have what the germans refer to as a "mindworm" an obsesive thought. of course you may be incubating an alien. or maybe a fungus. Hey, I got it. Be like an alcoholic.
Just say no...don't share. do it all yourself.
pardon me, i have no right to be facetious but i can't resist. cockeyed.
Posted by alexandra_k on July 27, 2005, at 5:52:12
In reply to Re: please read..., posted by AMD on June 27, 2005, at 19:48:58
really.
im not one to preach about abstinence
but i am one to preach about not sharing certain kinds of accessories.
dont share straws and needles and stuff
BYO
Posted by alexandra_k on July 27, 2005, at 5:53:20
In reply to Re: don't share straws » AMD, posted by alexandra_k on July 27, 2005, at 5:52:12
or MAKE your own. i mean... how hard is it to roll something up into something that can function as a straw?????
ok. so you probably have learned your lesson. i really hope your tests come back clear.
This is the end of the thread.
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