I did it! First Xolair shot & AT HOME - no problems!!!

[Guest guest]

Hey, everyone, I FINALLY got my first Xolar shot at mid day today, Fri. Yes,

and I did it MY way! (think back to the song from the late 60s or early 70s!!!)

AT HOME!!!!

Apparently CuraScript must contract with nurse-supplier companies. They had

refused to come out and my pulmo's office wasn't really set up for a xolair

clinic. I was between a rock and a hard spot. My pulmo and I had agreed back

in mid Jan that I would go on Xolair. It took over a month to get Xolair, then

5-1/2 weeks to get a nurse to get injected. It was a hassle all the way.

Finally, an RN came to my house this morning and showed me how to mix and

administer the med.

This was all done at home with an RN - not at a doctor's office! So, take

that and that Genentech and FDA and Curascript and all the others who gave me

such a hassle! You did your best to make life miserable for me even acting in a

very condescending if not rude manner to me.

Really and truly I'm in more danger of getting hurt on the freeway and driving

50 - 120 miles to a doctor than I am in getting anaphylactic shock from Xolair.

For anyone out there who is squeamish, I swear that I never even felt the

needle go in. You can only press the plunger very slowly on the syringe because

it's such a small needle so there was no question about injecting too fast. Of

course, I was very eager to do everything right in the process, too! It was

sort've like inserting a needle into a hot dog but then I have plenty of fat !!!

<grin> The preparation is somewhat complex and I wish they had written down

each little step with a sketch but it's not that hard. It doesn't even itch -

the most I've gotten from it is a little bruise - with my lack of experince in

injecting myself and vision problems I didn't notice the blood vessels but it

still doesn't hurt!

I was a bit freaky about side effects but it's now 12 hours later and nothing

has happened. The nurse left immediately after the injection (I assumed he

would stick around the 2 hours) so I just quietly hung around the house for 2

hours close to phone by myself with an epi pen. I'm carrying the epi pen in my

purse everywhere I go for the first 24 hours as a precaution but so far I am SO

GLAD!

One thing to keep in mind when self injecting - give 30 seconds for the

alcohol wipe to dry before injecting as the alcohol itself is irritating if it's

injected inside the body.

Can't wait to get some sort of relief from allergies - wish I knew how long it

will take but I guess everyone is different and they don't have any data to

predict it. My IgE was 350.

Personally, I think that if I were forced to go to a doctor's office for

injections for a long time and it was really causing me problems I would push

the matter of home injection big time. Obviously some of us are doing it

successfully. It's not for everyone but then people need to be treated as

individuals instead of objects for someone else's power trip.

I hope I can either get a nurse one more time or talk to someone on the phone

as I go through the next injection mainly just to make sure I do everything

absolutely right. But, I still think home injection is a good idea.

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