Talk:Cotton fever

Bacterium or virus?
At the beginning of the second paragraph, the causative agent is said to be a bacterium (complete with genus and species), yet in the last paragraph, it is referred to twice as a virus. It can't be both at the same time, so one of the words should be removed (I suspect virus is the incorrect word). 66.215.44.176 12:26, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

Cotton Fever and heroin withdrawal
in the last paragraph it is sayed that "Cotton Fever can produce nearly the exact same symptoms of drug withdrawal" I have expirianced both and I can clearly say that the are not resamble in no way exept the high fever and the headache part. belive me that although the cotton fever is very bad it could not be campared to the much worse heroin withdrawal.

Do you know if the red ring around the injection site is cotton fever Bjeremy825 (talk) 14:58, 27 January 2016 (UTC)

22 minutes?
Why was the timing of onset of symptoms changed from 20 to 22 minutes? As an infectious diseases doc myself, I can say almost nothing in this area is known with that kind of precision. People with post-heroin injection fevers generally do not come to the ER having timed their dose to the minute. I cannot tell whether this edit was made as a random mini-vandalism, or rather indicates someone with limited understanding of biology and statistics. Rcolgrove (talk) 19:42, 17 March 2014 (UTC)

What happens if the area around the injection site turns in to a red ring? Bjeremy825 (talk) 14:55, 27 January 2016 (UTC)

Rcolgrove, you are correct..it varies and it (or something very similar) can occur without using a cotton filter, even if the solution is filtered with a ~10 micron filter like Sterifilt, which are commonly available at needle exchanges (PCTE wheel filters, usually 0.4 micron have never failed in my case).

The symptoms are unmistakable and you usually know within 10 minutes if you screwed up. The muscle pain, shivering and shaking gradually ramp up, even hot water or several layers of warm clothing or such do nothing to warm you up. Having experienced this dozens of times, I would postulate that several kinds of impurities can cause largely similar symptoms, be it bacteria, a phantom fiber or dust particle, and so forth.

Sterile water, careful filtering and clean implements are the best safeguards against this. Also, bacteriostatic water is great if storing a solution for a longer time, preferably in a cold environment. I'm aware of the stigma, but thought I'd let you know my experiences anonymously.

37.219.53.12 (talk) 10:07, 20 June 2020 (UTC)

Treatment section sounds too much like medical advice
Information in the Treatment section sounds a little too much like medical advice. The generalised symptoms are extremely similar to other, much more serious illnesses, including sepsis. I'll leave it to someone with more specialised knowledge to reword this section. Prime Lemur (talk) 05:41, 29 March 2020 (UTC)