Kawasaki Disease & Carpet Cleaning!

[AvieJoysmommy]

Im sure that most of you have heard by now about John Travoltas boy and what they are saying about the correlation between having your carpets cleaned and Kawasaki disease.  Well ~ my 10 year old son spent 20 days in the hospital this summer battling the disease after his dads carpets were cleaned!!!!  Coincidence?  I for one do NOT think so!  They had their carpets done on Thursday and by Sunday he was sick and in the hospital!  I just want you all to be aware of the disease, it's symptoms, the correlation to carpet cleaning, and that this is SERIOUS! 

Kawasaki disease is a disease in which the arteries become inflamed!  This disease generally affects Asian boys under the age of 5 - my son is causasian and 10 years old - so obviously this can affect ANYONE!!!!  The disease has a high mortality rate if not treated with in 6 weeks and can cause long term damage to the heart (Corinary artery aneurysms CAA) and heart attacks if not treated within 10 days of onset of feaver!

Symptoms: 

~A fever that lasts more than 5 days ~ this does NOT have to be a high fever either, 100.4 degrees is high enough for concern if it lasts for more than 5 days!!!!

~A rash and then peeling of the hands, feet, and genital areas

~Enlarged lymph nodes

~Swelling of the lips and tongue (it is referred to as "Strawberry tongue" bc it literally makes the tongue look like a strawberry!) as well as hands and feet (other extremities may swell also)

~Redness of the eyes - looks like pink eye

~belly tenderness

Your child does NOT have to have all of these symptoms and can have more than these - the main one is the fever!!!!

These symptoms can come and go through out the duration of the illness and will eventually go away even without treatment.  However the CAA will NOT improve and can have devistating effects and even cause death!  Treatment is neccessary to prevent damage to the heart!

Please check out this site for more information http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kawasaki_disease 

I have looked at a lot of sites and feel this is one of the best ones and that it explains the disease very well!

I pray that no one ever has to deal with this disease!  May God bless and keep you all!

[mom2boys1329]

Feb. 16, 2009 at 11:10 PM

Thank you for posting this Julie. As you know we almost have our first home and we will have to clean the carpets! I will have to look more into that!

[supermom11995]

Feb. 25, 2009 at 1:43 PM

My son had this disease at age 2.  We didn't have the carpets cleaned, but they had just come and sprayed for bugs about a week before.  It was awful.

[twinangels07]

Jun. 25, 2009 at 12:17 AM

Thanks for the heads up.