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My MAC and bronchiectasis treatment

MAC & Bronchiectasis | Last Active: Feb 19, 2020 | Replies (48)

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@sueinmn

@derbeltal Well, everyone is different - you will hear that a lot here! My digestive issues were up and down the whole time on the antibiotics - them getting much worse after 6 months of daily meds contributed to the doc stopping the drugs. I have been off for 6 weeks now, and the stomach issues are subsiding. Here is what I have been doing, at the direction of my primary doc, to help it along.
Take daily probiotics. Use a proton-pump inhibitor (PPI) - in my case Omeperazole daily, in the morning. She originally suggested two weeks & stop, then continue at two week intervals, up to 2 months, if the issues persist. I will try stopping again next week, and am hopeful of being done as my stomach is feeling much better. (She also said to take Tums or similar for digestive upsets, something you are not supposed to do while on the antibiotics.)
To counter the weight loss, which I could ill afford, I have been forcing myself to eat a small high-nutrition, high-calorie bit of food every two hours for over a year. I eat an ounce of cheese, a handful of cashews, a scoop of peanut butter, a scoop of guacamole on crackers, 1/2 a protein bar, 6-8 ounces of high-calorie homemade fruit/veg/protein smoothie or similar. I do it, whether I am hungry or not, from 10 am until at least 6 pm, plus meals. Also, Carnation Instant breakfast in my coffee. This stopped the weight loss, but since stopping the meds I still have no appetite and haven't regained any weight.
My primary says to be patient - it is not unreasonable to take 4-6 months for everything to rebalance after 18 months of the meds.
Good luck as you continue this journey. Feel free to ask more questions as they arise.
Sue

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Replies to "@derbeltal Well, everyone is different - you will hear that a lot here! My digestive issues..."

Thanks for the input. My pulmonary dr. just put me on Prilosec. Maybe that will help. I have not been eating any snacks so I will start that. At least, it looks like it will get better since I am still new. I really appreciate all the information. Thanks so much. Hope everyone continues to do well.

I recently discovered Boost plus chocolate. It has 360 calories for a somewhat small bottle and is delicious.