IV antibiotics

Arlo is currently in hospital on 2 different IV antibiotics - Tobramycin and Ceftazidime.

His chest x-rays have confirmed that Arlo has RSV with a secondary bacterial infection (although we don’t yet know what bacteria we are dealing with as it’s not growing from his swabs - which in itself is a good sign as it’s unlikely to be pseudomonas or a really nasty bug if the lab is struggling to grow it from the many, many cough swabs we have done in the last week! So please keep your fingers crossed we get some answers!🤞)

If you need a poster for why IVs are worth it then I think this is it - on the left is a photo of Arlo about 6 hours before his first dose of IVs and on the right is Arlo after 5 days of IVs! 💪

The benefit of IV antibiotics rather than the oral antibiotics is that they are administered directly into the vein so they get to work faster and can be given at a higher concentration. 💉💊

It also means that doctors can mix different antibiotics like a kind of personalised drug combination to treat the specific illness/symptoms. 🧪

Arlo is given his IVs every 8 hours. Some are done via an infusion where a machine slowly pushes the drug through the line and others are done by them manually pushing the drug into the line using a syringe. They can take anywhere from ten minutes to an hour and a half depending on whether we get any line occlusions/blockages or any other delays.

Arlo has at least one dose in the middle of the night which has disrupted his sleep a few times but he’s honestly such a trooper.

These IVs are magic 🪄 and I’m so pleased we did this because they are clearly making a difference! 💪🙏🤞For the first time in a few weeks Arlo looks healthier and we hope the cough will be on the way out - for good - soon! ☺️