Question: Hi... I have been having strange symptoms that are being diagnosed as staph but not MRSA. A sore was cultured to rule that out. But they are not responding to 3 different rounds of Bactrim DS. They started close to a year ago now. My face started breaking out badly. My first thought was cystic acne, which surprised my as I am 45 (female) and have no history of acne at all. But the breakouts were not normal... They had multiple white stringy type areas in each of them that when I tried to squeeze out never ended and were very bloody. Also it literally spread to the surrounding skin and expanded the sore. Then they cleared up on my face and started popping up on my lower legs about 2 months after. Within the next year I kept getting more and more of them on my lower legs, then my lower arms, then I got them on my upper arms, upper legs, on my rear (extremely painful those were) and my back. They are very itchy, especially at night.... I have a very strange feeling in my left ear, like it's itchy but it's not.... It's hard to describe, it is bothersome and at night I get earaches that range from bad to really bad. I constantly spit up globs of mucus that has little gel like balls that stick together and can be pulled apart from the mucus intact... they have what looks like green strands in them but when I dry them they are tiny blue thread type things. When I scratch a body sore, the blood that comes out (along with normal red blood, is dark, like black... it is also gel like at when I move it around it also seems to have that threadlike stuff in it as well as little black specs of something and clear small things that curl up. When I push these things keep coming keep coming and then as soon as they are "done" no more blood or anything will come out. In the last week it seems all my joints hurt and ache.... neck, shoulders, elbows, wrists, hands, knees, ankles, feet, my stomache aches, not like a belly ache though. I can sleep all day long. I don't know it is connected but I want to include all my symptoms.... for the past three winters (I live in CT) I have had Pernio on my feet.... Is this really Staph? Why isn't it clearing up if it's not MRSA? What the heck is in my blood? When the sores heal they don't really heal.... The scars have a thin coating and under it is still bluish dark .... theres little pools of blood under them and they re-break open.

Hi Dr. Mittal, Thank you for response. It makes much sense to find WHY staph is not healing rather than assume my diagnosis has been wrong. I will print and bring your response to my appt. but I cannot see my Dr until the 21st. Just to follow up... Staph CAN cause the black specs and threadlike structures I'm seeing in my blood and mucus that I spit up and blow out my nose? And more IMPORTANT: does that mean it is in my blood and/or lungs? Thank you!

Thank you so very much for taking your precious time to be of so much help to people.... You are much appreciated and i wish you much happiness in life ~