When I asked Dr. J about a possible medication switch for my 4 year old, he mentioned that rifampin works well on bartonella in children.
I thought this was a pretty tough drug to tolerate, but would love to hear if your child took it and if there was improvement.
Did he/she take it on an empty stomach?
Thanks,
tickbattler
Posted by bettyg (Member # 6147) on :
no idea; anyone? headed for 2nd page...
Posted by Deb133 (Member # 18544) on :
My 15 year old daughter has been taking Rifampin since the end of January. She tolerates it very well and you need to take it on an empty stomach.
Deb G
Posted by Stacyb (Member # 13084) on :
Hi Tickbattler,
I think we have spoken thru PM's too about our kids. My son has been on Rifampin about 3 weeks and is handling it very well. He is almost 12 yrs old and on 300 mg a day. We are about to up the dose to an adult dose as I am not sure the lower dose is working with him. He is 103 lbs. so he is borderline for taking the adult dose.
We have him take Milk Thisle too to protect his liver with that med. He takes it at night before bed 14 hrs. away from the Rifampin which he takes as soon as he gets up on an empty stomach.
He also takes Zithromycin and takes that at dinner time away from the Rif. as it can pump out a lot of meds thru the liver.
I have been on Rifampin for many many months and really like it for Bartonella.
PM me if you want too. Hope that helps,
Stacy
Posted by laura miller (Member # 12703) on :
My 10 year old son is on it right now. He does take it on an empty stomach with no problems. Herxes have been minimal compared to flagyl, which were horrible! pm me if needed...
Posted by Hides1 (Member # 6348) on :
My 2 sons took it during summer of 2006 without any problems- at the time they were 6 and 9 years old. I think it helped the Bart. The Babesia had been harder for them to deal with.
Posted by tickbattler (Member # 14873) on :
Thank you all so much!
My son's babesia symptoms seem to be improving but he is getting more manic and aggressive (even kicking and punching other kids at school) and his constant headache and head buzzing is terrible. I really think this is bartonella. He has tested positive for two strains of it.
His teachers say his attention and behavior in preschool is really declining. He has been on bactrim since June 08 and I think it's time to try something else. Perhaps the bactrim worked against one strain, but I don't think it's touching the other!
Thanks again for your input...very helpful!
tickbattler
Posted by tickbattler (Member # 14873) on :
By the way, I got Dr. J to prescribe rifampin for my son and he started treatment on Saturday. On Sunday he had a 101 fever, which I think was a herx or die off.
Today is the third day and my son had the best day he has had in months. He was much more calm and wasn't kicking things and having fits about everything.
It was wonderful to see a glimpse of my little boy again. I hope so much that this continues.
Thanks again for all of your input. It really helped me decide to request a med change. I feel confident that I did the right thing.