This is kind of a full circle story. Above is Shawn Brillon. He's one of the main people up at the Orvis Mother Ship in Vermont. He worked for years in the fly division. He was the guy in charge of selecting fly patterns that were submitted by tyers for commercial consideration. If he approved them they
would then be sent overseas to one of the mills for production. He also had a hand in everything Orvis would carry in regards to fly tying. He then transferred over and became the man in the bamboo rod making department. From what I hear he is a master craftsman. I met Shawn during one of the Orvis events up in Manchester probably early in his career at Orvis. Recently I saw on Facebook a link to a Go Fund Me page that he created, for himself. It piqued my interest because you generally see other people start GoFundMe's on other people's behalf. And that caught this full circle story about half way around.
After we got home from Hilton Head I was trying to beat the heat by surfing the TV in the comfort of the lone room we have air conditioned. I typed in 838 for Netflix and waited for my profile to come up. Due to a ATM card change my account had been disabled so I had to go through the process of getting it back up and running. When it came on it recommended a documentary titled, "Hack Your Health- Secrets of Your Gut". On my first go around it did exactly what I wanted it to do- put me to sleep. But
over the next week or so I watched it and really got an education and appreciation on how important our gut really is. Now I teach GI (gastrointestinal) to nursing students up at the college. That system is
broken down into parts, Upper GI and Lower GI. It always amazes me how much we know about other things, fly fishing, mechanics, sports, and home projects but don't know where and how our own bodies work. And it is always fascinating when you learn something new about a topic you thought you had a
pretty good take on. The piece focuses on one's own microbiome- or the collection of bacteria in our bodies, both good and bad, which plays a part in digestion, obesity, mental health, hormone regulation, and inflammation and allergies. It really is all fascinating.
To keep in simple, so much of our life is controlled by what we eat, what our body does with it, and how we get rid of it. While feces, stool, poop, and shit, has a connotation of being disgusting, the process of elimination, and if it's normal or not, can tell us, and our medical providers, so much about our health status. We all hate providing a stool sample, and loathe the thought of going for a colonoscopy, both potentially life saving screening tools. We teach our kids how normal pooping is and
there are even toys and books available to help get our kids off, or out, in the right direction. While we are now in information overload with just about everything these days it's important to circle back to the basics from time to time for better understanding, and in turn, healthier and better living.
So I watched the documentary before I had to visit the dentist this past Monday for a tooth extraction. I hate going to the dentist and am probably an average person when it comes to my own
dental hygiene. My dentist had a plan for that tooth last year but of course I let it go until it cracked over the winter. While away in the Vineyard it started to really glow to the point I was chasing the Orajel with ibuprofen for most of the week with little relief. When I got back I made an appointment and dreaded his words and he took a look, "That tooth needs to go". Before Monday's appointment he had
prescribed me an antibiotic that I would either start when the pain got too intense or three days before the extraction. It was ordered to either attack the infection, or prophylactically, to ward one off from starting. Well a week before my appointment it started to hurt so I filled it and was off to the races. Dental work is known to lead to infections and even cardiac complications as gum and tooth infections can affect the valves in your heart if left untreated. But, here's where the story and the full circle starts to close up.
Antibiotics, while good, can also be bad. Providers have incorrectly overprescribed them for years which can do more bad than good. If you have a bacterial infection, great, if they give you the right one, if it's viral, it's a waste of time. A lot of times meds are prescribed for the patient's need to be treated, or helped, even if it may not do anything to help the underlying cause. And not only do antibiotics kill the bad stuff, but the good as well. One thing we see with some patients in the hospital is clostridium difficile colitis after a course of antibiotics are prescribed. The meds wipe out our microbiome, or good bacteria, and allow invaders, or bad bacteria to invade, our GI tract, with c-diff wrecking our colon, or large intestine. Some of these bugs reside in our bodies all the time, but are kept in check by our good bacteria in our GI tract, and antibiotics can just knock them, and their defense capabilities, out.
In Shawn's GoFundMe story he explains that his situation started with a dental procedure coupled with a course of antibiotics that lead to an outbreak of c-diff. Having c-diff can be a life threatening situation as not only does it affect the GI tract, but the intractable watery diarrhea can lead to things like electrolyte imbalances which can affect the heart and kidneys.
If left untreated or if treatment is resisted by the body patients with severe c-diff infections may have to undergo a process called a fecal microbiota transplant (FMT). In effect what it is is a stool transplant where stool from a healthy individual is transplanted to the patient hoping that the donors "good" GI bacteria will take hold and repopulate the recipients bowel. That is done by colonoscopy, NGT (nasogastric tube), enema, or in capsule form. Shawn mentions in his story the possibility of having to undergo an FMT as a last resort.
Like so many of us our access to medical treatment is controlled by the insurance companies, either HMO's, EPO's, POS's, or PPO's. Navigating health through third party interests can be extremely frustrating especially when complex conditions or co-morbidities exist. Shawn is stuck in that quagmire now, as any of us could be, and that is coupled with his inability to work during this time. This situation could have happened to anyone of us, especially those taking a course of antibiotics. And that's where that full circle story ends.
If you'd like to learn more, check out that documentary on Netflix. If you can or would like to read Shawn's story or make a donation you can see that
HERE on his GoFundMe page. Every little bit helps.
