A new daily ritual
3 August 2009
6 Comments
Today is the start of a new daily ritual that I will continue for the best part of the next year. Following eating breakfast, cleaning my teeth, washing and taking a vitamin tablet, I will now also need to remember to take an anti malarial tablet.
I will be in and out of malarial zones throughout my travels so I have got a 48 weeks supply of Doxycylcine. Doxycycline is a daily tablet which also needs to be taken for a few days before and for four weeks after being in a malarial zone, meaning that out of my entire trip, it will only be two weeks in Australia and my time in New Zealand that I won’t need to take them.
Hopefully I don’t suffer any side effects from them.
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Yikes!
I've had horrible reactions to doxcycline, so good luck with that.
I think I'm gonna take my chances with Malaria when I travel to India…
I've heard from others that at worst you get some diarrhea that should go away after 2-3 days. Hope that's not the case for you.. better than malaria though!
I'm surprised your doctor gave you a prescription for that long. We have been told that you can't take anti-malarials for longer than 4 months. We have previously taken mefloquine rather than doxcycline, but I am a bit worried about the horrid side effects associated with mefloquine so we might try doxcycline this time. Carla, I wouldn't risk malaria. My aunt and grandmother both got it in India and it killed their immune systems for a long long time. Mind you, they were a bit older but still . . . .
@Akila by no means do I want to get Malaria, but I do often wonder if anti-malarials are such a good idea.
I think long sleeved clothing, DEET, and mosquito nets are probably the best defense.
When I took doxycycline, I had hallucinations,chest pains, racing and irregular heartbeat and itchy hands. It was a horrible experience. Not trying to scare anyone, but it's definitely a lesson and good idea to try it at home before leaving.
I was prescribed doxycycline while traveling and took it for three days before taking myself off it.
How on earth do you carry 48 weeks of pills? That is, what sort of container are you traveling with to house them?
Just the blister packs. I put the 6 boxes into 3 to save space.