Local doctors are waging late-season germ warfare against myriad viral and bacterial infections.
Your stomach feels upset and you're developing a headache. Or perhaps you've come home from school or work feeling rundown and just not yourself. A few hours later, you're running a fever and ache all over.
Either way, you know you're coming down with something.
It's a familiar story to doctors and other healthcare professionals, who are seeing a host of late-season head colds, respiratory infections, stomach viruses and cases of the flu.
"Oh my goodness, it's been crazy," said Dr. Peter Honig, assistant director of general medicine at Methodist Hospital, Broad and Wolf, and medical director of St. Monica Manor, 2509 S. Fourth St. Honig also has a private practice at 1805 S. Broad St.
"This time of year, the stresses on the immune system - change of temperatures, exposure to closed environments - make you much more prone to any of these transmitted infections," the doctor said.
The most common ailments in fall and winter are upper- and lower-respiratory infections - both viral and bacterial, said Honig.
Respiratory infections are transmitted through the air, and smokers are most prone to them, the doctor said.
Upper-respiratory infections affect the throat and above, while those that settle in the lower tract strike below the throat. Head colds, sinusitis and rhinitis are three common upper-respiratory infections; bronchitis and pneumonia are two of the most common lower-respiratory ailments, said Honig.
In recent months, bronchitis has been on the rise. Smokers are often chronic bronchitis sufferers, the doctor said.
Upper-respiratory infections account for about three-quarters of the ailments Honig treats this time of year; lower-tract infections make up the rest.
A NASTY INFECTION that affects newborns and toddlers is respiratory syntitial virus, or RSV, said Cathy Soumerai, a registered nurse and director of infection control at Graduate Hospital, 1800 Lombard St.
At least 120 RSV cases were reported in the Philadelphia area when the virus peaked in January, she said. Adults can carry the virus, but it doesn't impact them like it does children.
Graduate has seen several isolated cases of RSV and pneumonia. But the big culprit for Graduate doctors this season has been the flu, said the nurse.
"It's still a major player - and the regular colds. It all seems to be a blur," Soumerai said. "There is no one big, bad bug. Influenza is still the one on our radar screen."
Honig, on the other hand, has not seen a case of the flu in the last week, and credits the vaccine for that.
"The flu is certainly not a widespread epidemic like we could have had if people didn't receive their flu shots," said the doctor.
About 75 percent of Honig's elderly patients were immunized.
Type A influenza is the most prevalent strain of the flu virus, said Health Department spokesperson Jeff Moran.
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