A WOMAN says she was “cooked from the inside out” after taking antidepressants.
Charlotte Gilmour suffered a severe reaction to lamotrigine – used to treat epilepsy and low mood in people with bipolar disorder – which left her covered in agonising blisters.
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The 23-year-old told Stuff: “I looked in the mirror, and I just burst into tears.
“I think I subconsciously knew it was something quite serious.”
Charlotte, from Palmerston North, New Zealand, had been battling a chest infection for several weeks before she woke up with a painful rash on her body.
She raced to the hospital, where nurses diagnosed her with Stevens-Johnson syndrome (SJS) – a rare but serious condition caused by the body’s overreaction to medicine, particularly epilepsy drugs, antibiotics, and anti-inflammatory painkillers like ibuprofen.
The problem was, staff didn’t know how to treat it – and without treatment, it can become life-threatening.
Charlotte said: “It was scary, I guess, hearing, ‘OK, no one really knows a lot about this’.
“But the scariest part is that it burned me from the inside out – so all the burns on the outside were because my insides were so burned that it started to manifest on the outside of my skin.
“The rash had started to take over my body.
“It was like my arm had been cooked. I could also feel the bone of the top of my mouth because my gums had died.”
The blistering in her digestive tract was so bad that she needed to be hooked up to a feeding tube.
Charlotte, who had “never been so scared”, was also put on steroids but they didn’t seem to help.
She quickly lost her vision, and desperately tried to keep herself awake for five days straight.
“I was so terrified that if I went to sleep I wasn’t going to wake up,” she told 1News.
Thankfully, after 30 days of treatment, Charlotte was discharged – but she still experiences some symptoms.
“I still get blisters pop up in my eyes and the rash flares up, always in the same place where the worst burn was,” she said.
She does, however, have a new outlook on life.
“I’m just so grateful for the small things that I used to take for granted,” she said.
Though they can’t be certain, doctors think Charlotte’s SJS was triggered by lamotrigine, which she started taking two months earlier.
I could feel the bone of the top of my mouth because my gums had died
Charlotte Gilmour
According to DermNet, SJS is more likely to happen in the first eight weeks of taking medication.
Symptoms usually begin with headaches, joint pain and a cough, followed by a rash, the NHS says.
This often looks like a target – with a purple or dark area of skin surrounded by a lighter one.
Moist areas of tissue, like the eyes, inside of the mouth and throat, can also get blisters and ulcers.
SJS requires hospital treatment. This typically involves intravenous fluids, pain relief, topical steroids and antibiotics.
There are an estimated six cases per million people every year in the UK, according to a 2017 study.
It has a mortality rate of between five and 40 per cent, depending on how much of the body is affected.
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What is Stevens-Johnson syndrome?
Stevens-Johnson syndrome is a rare but serious skin reaction, usually caused by taking certain medicines – often epilepsy drugs, antibiotics and anti-inflammatory painkillers.
It is named after the two doctors who described it in the early 20th century.
It can be life-threatening so requires immediate hospital treatment.
Symptoms usually start with flu-like symptoms, such as a high temperature, sore throat, cough and joint pain.
A rash usually then appears a few days later – spreading from the upper body to the face, arms, legs and genitals.
You can also get blisters and sores on your lips, inside your mouth and on your eyes.
Hospital treatment usually involves fluids to prevent dehydration, creams and dressings to moisturise the skin, strong painkillers to ease discomfort and medicines to control inflammation and prevent infection.
It can take several weeks or months to fully recover.
Source: NHS