Deadly Script!

I Am prescribed levotoxin! Double pneumonia again 
 
Now I know my Doctor is out to get me! 
 
Which reminds me. At my last check up he told me he used to be a photographer and then promptly said "Bend over and say cheese". 

Mesh
Are you sure it's Levotoxin and not levothyroxine (or even worse Livotox)?
One of them treats thyroid dysfunctions while the other is to protect the liver of chickens.
Didn't see anything on 'Levotoxin'.
 
I hope you accidentally didn't go see the veterinarian....

my bad  I misred it. It is levofloxcin 

Bayou,
 
Just a couple notes on Levaquin. Without cultures, it is a good knee jerk approach for pneumonia that has been acquired outside a hospital setting. Hope it works and good chance that it will.
Things to be aware of.
 
Don't take any metallic dietary supplements within 2 hours on either side of the daily dose. Means all milk products, all minterals (vitamins okay, vitamins with minerals not). No fast acting antacids (Tums, Rolaids, Maalox, etc). No calcium supplements. The metals in these things chelate or bind with the levofloxacin and form a complex that is too big to be absorbed. Means you are taking the pill but it is not getting to the lungs. It's hard enough to get an antibiotic to the lungs under good conditions.
 
The group of quinolone antibiotics can cause a brittleness in the tendons of the body that may last a couple months after the last dose. I've had people snap all kinds of tendons post levofloxacin, like pressing down too hard on a pencil and snapping a finger to rupturing bigger tendons in the ankles and arms. For the couple months after, just be light duty on trying to life heavy things or excess stress on joints.
 
Though you can't take something like yogurt or a probiotic at the same time with Levaquin, a wide spectrum probiotic is needed a couple times a day and for 2 weeks after to undo some of the damage caused to the good guys in the intestine.
 
Good luck. You will get through this.
 
John
 

Bill,
 
We are all turning to biological cement over time. Me pushing 69, and not a whole hell of a lot of advantages to getting old. Vaguely remember a Dear Abby tirade decades ago as she was shriveling up past her prime, about the benefits of women getting older. Matronly appearance, glow of wisdom. Could not find an arthritic benefit to be had otherwise in the long article about the joys and benefits of getting old.
 
The tendons can be somewhat rejuvenated by torsion and stretching, but nothing you want to do for 2 months after stopping Levaquin. Otherwise you will tear yourself up almost beyond repair, but this goal needs to be done once past the danger point of Levaquin induced tendon fracture. Hands, wrists, arms, spinal exit of the nerves animating the fingers need to be healed.
 
I'm sure they advised "incentive spirometry" if they have their act together and maybe gave you one of the plastic contraptions with inhalation tube and the ball that floats and tells you how much you are inhaling. Critical to do the breathing exercises several times a day to get rid of the "tidal volume", the residual air volume left in the lungs with a weak exhalation. This is where bad bacteria and yeast breed and multiply if not blown out with exertion that was needed for survival many thousands of years ago. Laid back lifestyle was never in our genetics. Sit in front of a computer screen for a couple hours and something ate us. Movement as much as you can tolerate is needed. Just enough to get you winded and breathing deeply if this only means walking around the house. Maybe 3 times a day and this will be a big help in healing.
 
Bummer about pneumonia is that the bugs are coated in a "polysaccharide" sheath, sugary goos that evade the human immune response. Thus the bugs if they can establish residence, will grow and prosper off the radar of the immune system. Human immunity, if it works can take months or longer to identify and eradicate pneumonia, if the disease doesn't take us out first before we can figure out a battle plan.
 
Please keep posted as how you are doing.
 
About the probiotic, cheapest way to get good bugs is with yogurt or Keifer. Don't know if you got access to Nancy's brand, but this is my choice. Otherwise check the shelves and make sure the yogurt states live cultures and with as many arcane names of the inhabitants. Avoid store brands on sale because they are mainly ground horse feet, starch and sugar. Some pasteurized after the fact leaving a dead toxin in a fancy plastic container. I got a killer process for creating hi potency probiotics for pennies on the dollar if you or anyone else is interested.
 
Once past the window of brittle tendons, stretching and limbering of the whole body is absolutely critical. The yoga exercises are of paramount importance to the human condition once we are past our teens and on the downhill to death arc. The stretches in isolation have nothing to do with yoga as a spiritual ascent, so no religious or political crap needed to get to a healthier existence.
 
John

Bill,
 
Here it is in all it's glory... A cut and paste of a recipe document I put together awhile back. Might have already posted it here, but with my Alzheimer's, I can't remember what I posted yesterday. Lot of fun though and you can mix/match stuff from the grocery isle and come up with incredible new products.
 
Would add to this in the spirit of building up intestinal good guys and about the mention of avoiding artificial sweeteners for the aesthetics. Evidence lately that the artificial sweetener Splenda is worse than for just being an artificial sweetener and the havoc they all inflict on the brain and pancreas. Splenda seriously damages intestinal flora as bad as antibiotics.
 
Cut and paste is as follows...
 
"My hope is to submit a bible of probiotic culture because of the importance in fighting the battle for health and a long life. In ancient cultures, daily dietary intake was considered one of the 7 secrets to long life. If any of you gets into this with success, I done my contribution.
 
Hardware props needed are one of those Igloo type lunch coolers and 4 wide mouth Mason jars with lids. Large pan with a lid that will take the gallon volume for preheating. Thermometer optional. And I guess a stove.
Start with a gallon of fresh whole 4% milk and add a heaping teaspoon of some kind of sugar or honey, and about 1/4 teaspoon salt.  Add 1 cup powdered dry milk.
 
Heat  to just short of boiling or when the milk starts to simmer (don’t let the milk burn on the bottom of the pan. Do this preheating to pasteurize the milk and kill off bad bacteria).
 
Allow the mixture to cool to about 115 degrees. (Clean finger in milk to count of 10 until it is too hot, or use a yogurt thermometer). Add 3 heaping tablespoons live yogurt and stir in well once the temperature is down.  (Nancy’s, Activia, Mountain High…anything live). It does take some time for the temp to cool down requiring monitoring periodically. Once mixed, it will take maybe 10 hours to complete, but this phase is on autopilot.
Put mix into 4 clean wide mouth mason jars and close lids. Place jars in the insulated cooler and fill the cooler with hot tap water up to the rims of the jars. Do not disturb the cooler for at least 8-10 hours or more. Yogurt made at night before sleeping will usually be ready to refrigerate by the next morning.
 
You can take a few tablespoons of the new yogurt and freeze it for the next starter. New batches from the same starter should be used in a new mix with a different sugar, or something different. The same mix will eventually weaken the end product.
 
A few tips, tricks, observances, philosophical spins…
 
You do not have to be in an absolutely sterile realm for this to work, but you are creating an environment to grow bacteria. Most stray bugs are below the heat barrier, but something nasty could get loose if you don’t keep things clean. Keep the milk covered while cooling and only test the temperature with clean utensils or fingers. Mason jars rinsed with hot tap water is sufficient.
 
You have a lot of control over the nature of the end product by varying heat. Obviously too hot or too cold won’t work but within say 98 to 120 degrees or so, the same bug will give a different yogurt. Borderline too hot or too cold and the yogurt will have a blah blandness like eating Elmer’s glue without the sweetness. Higher working temperatures otherwise produce a product that is more tart and with more whey separation on top. The whey can be used in cooking. Cooler temps produce a more bland yogurt with less separation. Would advise first trials to target the 115 degree mark. Then experiment on the edge.
 
Addition of the salt sugar and dried milk powder to the whole milk base is optional but makes the mix more firm when done.
 
Once everything is mixed, try not to disturb or shake the stuff as it can interfere. That’s why most home warriors set it up for night time cultivation.
 
Anything that is live will work, but make sure your source indicates live active cultures. I tend to avoid the sale store brands because they use ground up horse feet and starch to clot the stuff, allowing them to use only a small amount of actual yogurt. Add enough sugar and industrial chemicals to the clotted corpse and you think you are eating something good for you. Some of these brands are pasteurized after the fact to kill off everything and extend shelf life. These are worthless and you just lost your investment in a gallon of milk and your time wasted.
There are brands you can use like Activia that are a mono culture. Extremely vibrant, but all their line contains artificial sweeteners. These chemicals are so strong on our brain that even though you have done a dilution worthy of homeopathic titrations, the result will still be almost as sickening sweetened as the original. For variety I otherwise use cultures with multiple sources. My favorite is Nancy’s brand although this may be hard to obtain outside Oregon USA. Insane power in the hands of the creator is that you can mix and match different sources and come up with your own formula through trial and error. Scandinavians are way beyond us US yanks in this science, and have been for decades. Go to the store and purchase your refined gradient of probiotic by the identifying number across a vast selection.
 
If you like the stuff with fruits, sugar, additives, add them later, not in the original processing.
The Greek yogurt fad. Greater number of probiotics, more protein which they properly claim. Better for you, something exotic. Actually just made out of the normal rotgut cultures. They culture and squeeze out the liquid making it more dense, thus “Greek”. Sorry to bust the myth.
 
Acceptable probiotics… Uh…  There are at least 5 genetic lines of probiotics that would work well in yogurt and deliver the real health benefits. Problem is that some of them are cultured residents in our colon and would likely affect a company’s sales if they were used. We tend to stick with Lactobacillis and not include the other goodies that sound really great on paper but may cause a mental disturbance if you were staring into a spoon and thought about the source.
 
These bugs have undergone a lot of selection, and hard work to come up with something that has health benefits and is also palatable. All Lacto’s are not the same. If you are taking a pill probiotic, the big question in an unregulated market is if the non refrigerated bottle of capsules you just forked out 10 dollars for is any good. Simple test. Sacrifice one of the capsules in a cup of warm milk overnite. In the morning, you should have yogurt. Will smell like and have the consistency of a cultured product, but obviously nothing you would want to eat. Verification procedure we used in the hospital in selecting our source for patients, making certain that the pill was viable."
 
John