OOOOPPPSS!!!

Today was my 11th day of taking Iodoquinol to kill my dientamoeba fragilis parasite. I had noticed less cramping lower left quadrant pain recently. I've also slept in several days (which I needed to recover from a bad cold), because excruciating gut pain no longer wakes me up at 5am. Yet somehow I forgot to take my Iodo capsule at breakfast. I usually put the capsule on the lid of the bottle before the meal. Then about halfway through the meal I take the capsule with food (actually well sandwiched between layers of food) to prevent stomach pain. However, I noticed when I set out vitamins before lunch that the Iodo capsule was STILL sitting there.

Since I read that if I miss a dose I should just take the next dose if I remembered close to the time of the next dose, I took what should have been the morning capsule with lunch. I'm rather irritated at myself for missing that dose. I want to get rid of this parasite with the Iodo treatment. After all, Iodo is my third different drug for this parasite. I actually don't think the other 2 drugs are suitable for treating d-frag. Alinia was my previous clueless doc's first choice of treatment for d-frag. Perhaps, if he would have prescribed a longer treatment period, Alinia might have worked. However Alinia is never prescribed for d-frag treatment. My first choice had been Iodo, but I went along with my doc's choice, because I assumed he knew something I didn't. Now I think he didn't really consider what drug is considered the most effective. He was just guessing.

In hindsight, I wish I could have requested Iodo compounded w/o lactose, rather than requesting Humatin, after Alinia didn't work. However, I didn't realize drugs could be compounded to avoid allergens. I can't understand why my previous doc didn't mention compounding. I really wonder how much experience he has with prescribing drugs to treat intestinal bugs. I wonder how much of my history of recurrent gut infections was influenced by his discounting my symptoms, which deterred me from requesting tests, and then his prescribing the treatments for mild infections after I had each gut infection for at least 2 months by the time he received my test results. GRRRRRRR!!!

Nevertheless, missing one dose just means I'll take that last dose at the end. I'll take 3 evenly spaced doses, rather than 2 on the last day. My parasite symptoms have decreased slightly, but not enough to for me to feel 'well'. So I'm glad to continue fighting d-frag for another 10 days.