I just read this article, and it gave me a lot to think about.  How many children are misdiagnosed and taking unnecessary medications?  I went through a similar experience with my son, but not nearly as serious at the girl in the article experienced.

In the fall of 2010, my son started complaining of knee pain, and his pediatrician noticed it was slightly swollen when we went in for an ADHD follow-up visit.  Even though he had not had any recent illnesses, she suspected reactive or post-strep arthritis, so she immediately ordered blood work to check for strep antibodies and a chest x-ray to make sure there was no heart damage.  The blood work came back positive and the x-ray was negative, so we embarked on six months of bicillin injections, which are painful and expensive.

Thankfully, everything turned out fine and he recovered completely.  I am so glad that we have such a thorough and caring pediatrician, and she was able to catch that.  With my students, I am so vigilant that students who I suspect have strep are taken to the doctor and treated.

I hope everyone's semester/school year is going well; we are starting to wind things up here.  State testing ended yesterday, and I am making my list of my end of the year tasks.  I hope to be back here soon!  If you have any questions or topics you'd like me to write a post about, please let me know in the comments.