We’ve all heard about how the over use of many antibiotics leads to the development of antibiotic resistant bacteria, often referred to as superbugs. MERSA is one of those and it can be quite deadly, but there is another that many people have never heard of that can also be deadly.

Over the past month, my wife has had two bouts of intestinal problems, characterized by days of uncontrollable and explosive diarrhea and abdominal cramping. After a few days, the diarrhea contained blood from her intestines. After the first bout and a visit to urgent care and the emergency room, she was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis and given two antibiotics and told to go on a dairy and fat free diet. After several days, her symptoms subsided and she began to feel better, until last week when they came back with a vengeance again.

We managed to get her in to see a gastroenterologist who said she may not have colitis per se, but a serious intestinal infection that could be very serious and very contagious, so she ordered tests of stool samples.

The infection she suspected is commonly known as C diff, short for Clostridium difficile, a bacterium that can and does wreak havoc on the human body. If you’ve never heard of C diff, you need to be aware of it because it’s more common than you think. Check out what the Mayo Clinic says about C diff:

Clostridium difficile (klos-TRID-e-um dif-uh-SEEL), also known as Clostridioides difficile and often referred to as C. difficile or C. diff, is a bacterium that can cause symptoms ranging from diarrhea to life-threatening inflammation of the colon.

Illness from C. difficile most commonly affects older adults in hospitals or in long-term care facilities and typically occurs after use of antibiotic medications. However, studies show increasing rates of C. difficile infection among people traditionally not considered to be at high risk, such as young and healthy individuals who haven’t used antibiotics and who haven’t been in a health care facility.

Each year in the United States, about a half million people get sick from C. difficile, and in recent years, C. difficile infections have become more frequent, severe and difficult to treat. Recurrent C. difficile infections also are on the rise. [emphasis mine]

Why did the doctor strongly suspect my wife may have been suffering from C diff? The ER doctor placed her on 2 antibiotics, but after just a couple of days, my wife began to experience side-effects from one of the antibiotics so she stopped taking it, but continued to take the other, the one she was familiar with.

When she saw the gastroenterologist, the doctor said that by discontinuing the one antibiotic but continuing on the other, the doctor said that quitting the one but continuing to take the other was the perfect scenario to develop a serious C diff infection.

C diff is highly contagious and is easily passed from person to person via contact with an infected person or even handling their soiled laundry. If left uncontrolled, C diff can lead dehydration, malnutrition, anemia and severe intestinal bleeding. The damage to the intestines can be permanent and can be fatal, if not properly treated.

Fortunately, the stool sample tests have shown that my wife does not have C diff or any of several other suspected intestinal infections. That leaves colitis, which comes in various forms and causes. The next step to determine what type of colitis she is suffering from is a colonoscopy, which will also tell us how to treat it.