I was given amoxicillian on Feb. 19 (for a sinus infection) and took it for 4 days before having to stop it because it irritated my pouch terrible and gave me diarrhea and terrible gas. Then, on Tuesday, 12 days after stopping the antibiotic, I have broke out into hives--I am even getting them on my hands and feet. I went to the clinic Friday and they gave me a benedryl and solymedrol(sp) shot and sent me home with a 5 day course of prednisone and instructions to take 1 benedryl every 4 hours. I still have the hives, and they get worse on my hands and feet when I am up moving around. I cannot think of anything that may have caused them except for the antibiotic, but I stopped taking it many days ago.
Has this happened to anyone else? I am going crazy. My pouch function is actually pretty good right now though, so that is one good thing.
Any advice would be appreciated.
Becky

Hi Becky,

I doubt that the antibiotics would still be in your system this far out from stopping them so the hives are probably from something you've eaten or have developed an allergy to.

I get a severe reaction to insect bites and only need to be bitten once to end up with many hives. My allergy to wasp stings can be life-threatening and I have to carry an epi-pen everywhere with me. Perhaps you could ask your doctor to test you for allergies and see hwat comes up?

Antihystamines tend to dry me out and combined with the steroids, I suspect this is helping your pouch to function well at the moment. Don't be surprised if your frequency goes back up again once you've stopped the meds for these hives.

Hope you get some relief soon.

Take care

Shell

Actually, allergic reactions can occur weeks after using antibiotics, particularly the penicillins. The fact that you reacted so strongly to it during treatment is also indicative of it as a culprit. You need to make sure not to take it again because reactions tend to get more severe as exposure increases. If your docs do decide to use a penicillin or related antibiotic drug in the future, you probably should have a skin test first.

http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000820.htm

Jan

Were you on any pain meds. I still use vicoden on occasion, and get real itchy every time.