Kate has aspergillosis and like many other patients with a form of chronic aspergillosis, she has to follow a daily routine of medication preparation and consumption. Kate’s granddaughter is amazing at helping her Nanny.
If you haven’t got aspergillosis or other incurable chronic disease or you don’t live with someone who does you really should watch this short video as it will bring to your realisation the sheer amount of preparation and work it takes just to manage your medication every single day. Then consider the impact all those medications have on Kates health, commonly making her feel nauseous, cough uncontrollably, lose weight quickly, or put on weight, make all movement difficult and exhausting or just make her so fatigued it is a huge effort of will just to get out of bed.
People with aspergillosis can have all of those symptoms – and those are the good days!
During a flare-up of ABPA or when their lungs get an infection on top of the aspergillosis, they may have to take large amounts of antibiotics or even be admitted to hospital for a few days to have liquid antibiotics administered directly into the bloodstream. Or some people with aspergillosis experience bleeding from their lungs, coughing up hundreds of millilitres of blood in an episode.
Aspergillosis is a tough disease to live with. #WorldAspergillosisDay