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Complications from shingles in the elderly can lead to serious, long-term health problems. They range from bacterial skin infections that can cause scarring and narcotizing fasciitis to hearing and vision loss, encephalitis, transverse myelitis, peripheral motor neuropathy, and postherpetic neuralgia (PHN).
PHN occurs when the shingles rash goes away, but the pain doesn’t, and it can last for months or even years. PHN pain is felt in the same area where the rash was, and for some people it’s the worst and longest lasting part of shingles. Sufferers can experience depression, anxiety, confusion, trouble sleeping, and weight loss. Many have trouble with simple daily activities like dressing, bathing, and socializing due to the debilitating pain.
“Even in those cases of breakthrough shingles in somebody who’s been vaccinated, the severity of the shingles is so much less that people are exceedingly unlikely to have any of the dreaded complications—spinal cord damage, blindness, and deafness,”
I’ve had both the first gen shingles shot, and the Shingrx shots. I experienced no severe reaction, except for bad pain at the site of the first Shingrx injection. Second shot was very ordinary, as shots go.
My husband had shingles 2 years after getting the vaccination. My SIL had it at 32 as the father of a newborn. My daughter had it at 38 on her face and thought was acne. NONE of them said it was extremely painful just itchy. My daughter said it did not even itch.
I had a rash on my back last year. Looked like prickly heat. It itched but only if my clothing or bra touched it. Was it shingles? Who knows? I do not go to doctors. It cleared up on it's own in a couple of weeks.
I am not going to a doctor to get a shingles vaccination, or anything else. I too would have to pay full price because I do not have drug coverage. Husband hasn't gotten the new one. Certainly, my SIL and Daughter are far TOO YOUNG to be given it, unless they want to spend a few hundred dollars which they can use for something else in their lives.
My father got shingles. He never complained about pain. He told me it was the worst pain he could remember.
Really, especially since you don’t want to go to a doctor, you should get the shot.
What is the best choice of gap between the first and second shots and whether it affects the reaction. I and my wife got our first shot about a month ago - had a mild reaction the day after the shot but nothing terrible. We were advised to get the second shot between 2 to 6 months after the first shot. I am tempted to get the second shot after 2 months to get it over with but wondering about the correlation between gap and the severity of reaction. Even outside of that, does anyone have any information about whether it is better to be closer to 2 months or 6?
Thank you for a couple of responses to this question. Doing a bit more search, I did not find anything on the correlation between the interval between the shots and the reaction, but interestingly there seems to be variation based upon the age of the recipient. Anyway, you might find the following links useful:
The following link contains a description of the studies on the vaccine - and seems like all the patients in the two studies got the shot on a 2 month interval - link: https://www.contagionlive.com/public...les-prevention
We just had the second of the new two stage shingles shot. The first one didn’t bother either of us much, a little bit of soreness at the injection site, my wife more so. The second one, both of us had more of a reaction. We both had really uncomfortable back aches the next day and just felt off for that whole day. After that, back to normal. It’s been about two weeks since the last shots. We’re both 71.
I don't recall any of my relatives having the shingles and I'd bet they all had chicken pox as did I. I'm banking on my load of antioxidants that I have been taking to keep my immune system in tip top condition...I don't like to be shot up.
Far better to get the vaccinations and whatever side effects than to get shingles!
Half of my face and one ear were covered in a severely itchy—burningly painful—rash for weeks. Some nights it felt like sharp needles were being poked repeatedly into my inner ear. It took six weeks, IIRC, for the symptoms to go away. During that time I worried that people would assume it was contagious.
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