Henoch-Schonlein Purpura

The good news is that we have a mild, self-resolving diagnosis for Braden. I'll admit that I had let my concern grow to worry over the Christmas break. Here are the symptoms we were dealing with: he was not eating very much, complained of headaches and stomach aches almost daily, complained of his ankles hurting, nosebleeds, low energy, and significant weight loss. For a Momma with just enough medical knowledge to make me dangerous, I had gotten worried! About the time I expressed my concern to Jason, then Braden started having low grade fever at night, three nights in a row. We decided Wednesday night we would take him to the doctor the next morning. So, Thursday morning he wakes up with all these mosquito-bite-looking-things on the backs of his legs!

Thanks goodness for our pediatrician! We came into the doctor's office with our laundry list of complaints. She said, "Let me see his legs." She immediately said, "I bet he's got Henoch-Schonliein Purpura, do you know what that is?" Uh, no, but thanks for thinking I might know what that is!! She spouted off the info about HSP, and reassured us that he will be all better within 4 weeks. I was quite impressed that she knew exactly what he had, although she passed it off as something that was obvious!

In a nutshell, HSP is a virus that usually occurs during cold weather season, after some kind of upper respiratory infection that your body does not fight off properly. It is a form of blood vessel inflammation that most commonly causes skin rash, joint inflammation, and abdominal pain. He did have protein-packed urine, so we have to do a follow-up next week to make sure the kidneys are doing what they are supposed to do. Other than that, basically just let the rash take its course and treat the headache/stomachache symptoms as they come.

Everyone else is healthy around here, as far as we know!