What are the odds of me getting TSS (Toxic Shock Syndrome) when using tampons?!
Question: What are the odds of me getting TSS (Toxic Shock Syndrome) when using tampons!?
Answers:
( Sorry this is so long, it is an important topic)!
Chances of getting TSS is very low if you are taking all the right precautions when using tampons!. Make sure you are not using higher than needed absorbency, the more absorbent the greater the risk, it may be related to a "drying" of the vagina, as well tampons contain things such as artificial fibers like rayon which causes added issues!. Change them OFTEN, do not reuse them and watch for signs of TSS and if you have any go directly to your Dr!. TSS signs include, sudden fever (102 degrees or more), vomiting, diarrhea, flu-like symptoms, fainting, dizziness, and/or a red rash on the body!.
**FACT
Men, women and children can get toxic shock syndrome, for example following burns, boils, insect bites or infections after surgery!. About half of the reported cases are linked to women who use tampons; the other half are not!.
That said about TSS, there are MANY other health issues to consider when deciding to use tampons, ( and pads however pads are not inside us), many women are not aware of other health effects, they can however be as serious as TSS!. Tampons contain many harmful ingredients, fillers, chemicals!.!.!.these include aluminum, alcohols, fragrance additives and hydrocarbons and worse yet the chlorine bleaching process creates dioxins!. Chlorine, in laundry, swimming pools, or in tampons, breaks down into a deadly chemical called dioxin!. Dioxin is one of the most dangerous chemicals on the planet and literally a tablespoon [of it] would kill everyone on the planet,)!.!.!.Dioxin has been proved to cause cancer and Endometriosis, fibroids (growths in the uterus), pelvic inflammatory disease, PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome)!.
The effects of the dioxin can be measured as much as 20 to 30 years after exposure, its the cumulative effect that is the cause for concern as it is said that the average woman can use as many as 11 to16 thousand tampons in her menstrual lifetime
Though manufacturers say it is not detectable levels and that they are now produced using elemental chlorine-free or totally chlorine free bleaching processes which does not produce dioxins in levels harmful to people, many study's say otherwise!. The FDA has not conducted its own tests to draw definite conclusions one way or the other and has not called for testing of potential dioxin levels in tampons, as well it does not require package warnings!. Fibers like Rayon cause tiny cuts and can embed pieces into the vaginal/cervical tissue!.
A much safer alternative is using unbleached cotton tampons and pads, there are several on the market!. Please read up on all the issues concerning what to use and make your own informed decision!. While its true dioxins and chemicals are present in many things, why add another to the list of what is getting into your body, especially in such an intimate place, when there are other safer alternatives to use!. Here are some helpful links with great info! There is also a list of good products and alternatives!.
Good luck, hope some of this helped!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
Chances of getting TSS is very low if you are taking all the right precautions when using tampons!. Make sure you are not using higher than needed absorbency, the more absorbent the greater the risk, it may be related to a "drying" of the vagina, as well tampons contain things such as artificial fibers like rayon which causes added issues!. Change them OFTEN, do not reuse them and watch for signs of TSS and if you have any go directly to your Dr!. TSS signs include, sudden fever (102 degrees or more), vomiting, diarrhea, flu-like symptoms, fainting, dizziness, and/or a red rash on the body!.
**FACT
Men, women and children can get toxic shock syndrome, for example following burns, boils, insect bites or infections after surgery!. About half of the reported cases are linked to women who use tampons; the other half are not!.
That said about TSS, there are MANY other health issues to consider when deciding to use tampons, ( and pads however pads are not inside us), many women are not aware of other health effects, they can however be as serious as TSS!. Tampons contain many harmful ingredients, fillers, chemicals!.!.!.these include aluminum, alcohols, fragrance additives and hydrocarbons and worse yet the chlorine bleaching process creates dioxins!. Chlorine, in laundry, swimming pools, or in tampons, breaks down into a deadly chemical called dioxin!. Dioxin is one of the most dangerous chemicals on the planet and literally a tablespoon [of it] would kill everyone on the planet,)!.!.!.Dioxin has been proved to cause cancer and Endometriosis, fibroids (growths in the uterus), pelvic inflammatory disease, PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome)!.
The effects of the dioxin can be measured as much as 20 to 30 years after exposure, its the cumulative effect that is the cause for concern as it is said that the average woman can use as many as 11 to16 thousand tampons in her menstrual lifetime
Though manufacturers say it is not detectable levels and that they are now produced using elemental chlorine-free or totally chlorine free bleaching processes which does not produce dioxins in levels harmful to people, many study's say otherwise!. The FDA has not conducted its own tests to draw definite conclusions one way or the other and has not called for testing of potential dioxin levels in tampons, as well it does not require package warnings!. Fibers like Rayon cause tiny cuts and can embed pieces into the vaginal/cervical tissue!.
A much safer alternative is using unbleached cotton tampons and pads, there are several on the market!. Please read up on all the issues concerning what to use and make your own informed decision!. While its true dioxins and chemicals are present in many things, why add another to the list of what is getting into your body, especially in such an intimate place, when there are other safer alternatives to use!. Here are some helpful links with great info! There is also a list of good products and alternatives!.
Good luck, hope some of this helped!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
o wow i remember i used to be terrified of using them I really didn't even like the idea!. But the odds of getting TSS are so dramatically low (it only happens if you are extremely careless) and the convenience and comfort far outweight the statistical 0!.000015% chance of getting it (thats fifteen out of a million)!.
just don't be afraid to try it once you know!? and if, after this period, you decide you really dont like them, thats just fine becaue its your decision!. but if you're not willing to even try them you never know if you would end up loving them!.
(and I read your other question, about the pool one, and seriously it's worth it to just be brave and use one every now and then because that way you don't have to miss out on fun things because you're on your period and also its really not sanitary or polite to swim in a pool when youre on your period and you're not doing anything about it)Www@Answer-Health@Com
just don't be afraid to try it once you know!? and if, after this period, you decide you really dont like them, thats just fine becaue its your decision!. but if you're not willing to even try them you never know if you would end up loving them!.
(and I read your other question, about the pool one, and seriously it's worth it to just be brave and use one every now and then because that way you don't have to miss out on fun things because you're on your period and also its really not sanitary or polite to swim in a pool when youre on your period and you're not doing anything about it)Www@Answer-Health@Com
Apparently if you leave it in too long it could happen, but it's a very rare sickness!. I HATE using pads, so I change my tampons frequently and I wear them 24/7!. Been doing it for about 8 years, haven't gotten it yet :) Just make sure you change them lots!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
You have more possiblities with the scented ones!. I have a 12 year old staying with me right now that just went tothe hospital for tss from using the scented ones!. Just change it every few hours!. I have been using tampons for 18 years and never have gotten it!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
You can honestly go 12 hours maximum with the same tampon and you'll still be ok!. It's people who forget about them and leave them in for over a day that have problems because that bacteria will reproduce in the dark, warm vagina!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
If you use them right its very RARE :)
Please answer:
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http://answers!.yahoo!.com/question/index;!.!.!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
Please answer:
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Very low!. The composition of them has changed to make them safer over the years!. But it still isn't a good idea to leave them in all day!. Meaning, not changing it all day!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
here is the tampon safety site http://www!.fda!.gov/fdac/features/2000/20!.!.!. i hope this helpsWww@Answer-Health@Com
Keep sanitary, change OFTEN and use them properly and chances are VERY slim!Www@Answer-Health@Com
barley anything just take it out frequently they're way more comfortable than padsWww@Answer-Health@Com
They aren't very big odds!. Just make sure you change it every 4-6 hours!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
without changing them every 4 to 6 hours the risk goes up!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
as long as you use them properly, slim to none!Www@Answer-Health@Com
if you change ur tampon every 2-4 hours, then u don't have a problemWww@Answer-Health@Com
TSS is a rare disease that mainly strikes menstruating women who are using tampons!. About 15 women out of every 100,000 menstruating women come down with TSS!. It is caused by a bacteria called Staphylococcus aureus!. Scientists don't exactly know how all of this works yet, but somehow the combination of a tampon in a warm vagina is the perfect place for this bacteria to live and multiply!. This bacteria lets off toxins or poisons, and these get into a woman's bloodstream and make her very sick!. If it a bad case goes untreated the woman could die or suffer permanent effects!.
Menstruating women are not the only people who can get TSS, men, children and women who are not having their periods sometimes get TSS for other reasons, but most TSS cases are found in women using tampons!. Women under 30, and especially women between 15 to 19 are at the most risk because they have not yet developed any resistance to the toxins!. Older women who have used tampons for years may develop some immunity because they have been exposed to small doses over time!.
What are its symptoms!?
- A high fever - over 102 degrees
- Nausea
- Vomiting
- Diarrhea
- Sore throat and aching muscles
- A rash that looks like sunburn, especially on the hands and feet
- Dizziness or fainting - a drop in blood pressure
If you have any of these symptoms while wearing a tampon take it out immediately and call a doctor!. Tell them you have been using tampons and you think you have TSS!.
The symptoms are very much like flu symptoms, so it might be tempting to just wait and see if its the flu, or if it will go away!. But if you are having your period and using tampons take these symptoms very seriously!. TSS moves so fast that an overnight delay could be fatal!.
What happens if you get TSS!?
The sooner you get treatment, the better!. TSS moves through your body quickly!. Your doctor can do a test to see if the bacteria is present in your vagina!. For a mild case of TSS, you might just have to go to bed and drink lots of fluids!. If its a severe case, you will have to be hospitalized!. Again, TSS can be fatal and needs serious attention!.
When TSS is in its advanced stages, it is a really ugly disease!. Until I started researching it, I thought that if you had bad TSS you just had a really high fever and went into a coma or something!. The truth is scary, but something you should know!.
Your blood pressure goes down, which puts your body into shock!. Your skin will shed, as if you have been badly burned!. You might experience respiratory failure (you can't breath for yourself) or kidney failure (your kidneys stop cleaning your blood)!. Because your blood is not circulating well, the cells in your fingers and toes (the parts of your body which are farthest away from your heart) will start to die from lack of oxygen, and if a lot of the cells die, you could loose parts of your fingers and toes, or entire fingers and toes!. This is the same kind of thing that happens when people get bad frostbite!.
The after effects of a case of TSS are serious too!. Women who have survived a bad case may loose their hair and fingernails, have double vision, headaches, deafness, or arthritis for months or even years!.
Now that you are scared to death!.!.!.
How Do You Prevent TSS!?
Obviously, you can choose not to wear tampons, or use other internal products like sea sponges!.
However, using tampons wisely can give you much better odds of staying healthy!. There are two things you should think about each time you use a tampon: its absorbancy (how much fluid it can hold) and length of time it will be in you!.
The more absorbant a tampon is, the more dangerous it is!. Some people think the reason for this is that more absorbant tampons are made of a blend of cotton and rayon!. Plain cotton seems to be safe, but artificial fibers like rayon have been known to cause trouble (see History, below)!.
Tampax's Original Regular are 100 percent cotton, and may be one of the safest big brand tampons you can wear!. Health food stores sell tampons100 percent cotton and also bleached in environmentally friendly ways!.
There are now charts on all tampon boxes which show the absorbancy levels of the different sizes of tampons!. Choose a tampon size that is the minimum that you need for your flow!. In other words, a super-plus tampon might be fine if you will bleed through it in a few hours, but a tampon shouldn't be used as a plug you can leave in all day long!.
Which leads me to the second important point:
Don't wear tampons for a long time!. The best thing to do is to alternate between using tampons and pads!. At the very least, use smaller tampons and change them more often!. Never go to bed wearing a tampon (wear a pad instead), or wear the same tampon all day long!. Now, if your flow is very light, you will notice that it is hard to change tampons because they are sort of dry!. This isn't very good for you either, so you might just want to wear a mini pad on those light days!.
By using lower absorbancy tampons, changing tampons frequently, and taking breaks from tampons at some point each day, you can make it very hard for that bacteria to cause you any trouble!. Remember, as a new tampon user, you have the least defenses against the bacteria, so try to be careful!.
The history of tampons and TSS
Tampons were invented in the 1930's, and at that time they were made of compressed cotton!. But they leaked when they were soaked through, so tampon manufactures began to experiment with materials which would make a better (more absorbant), tampon!. They found their answer in synthetic fibers!. Proctor & Gamble wanted to make a leak - proof tampon!. They succeeded by using a blend of synthetic fibers which included polyester sponges and chips of carboxy-methyl-cellulose!. They called their new tampon RELY and put it on store shelves in 1975!. This encouraged an "absorbancy race" among other tampon manufacturers!. So by 1980 the market was full of new super absorbant tampons!. Reports of TSS began to flood in during the spring and summer of 1980, and all tampon brands were implicated, but particularly RELY!. Somehow the swelling of the synthetic fibers made an ideal growing place for the bacteria!. Maybe it also was due to the the fact that women didn't change these tampons as much!.
By 1981 absorbancy was found to be the key risk factor in tampon related TSS!. Any high absorbancy tampon was proved to increase a woman's risk of getting TSS!. Playtex's Super Plus was deemed a "high risk" tampon!. Following the TSS breakout, Tambrands (makers of Tampax) reissued the safer all cotton Original Regular style, but retained super absorbant ingredients in its other models!.
In 1985 the family of Betty Ogilvie, a woman who had died from TSS, won their lawsuit against International Playtex!. They were awarded eleven million dollars, because the jury found that Playtex had shown reckless disregard for women's lives by continuing to make the super high abosorbancy tampons when it was known that they were a major cause of TSS!.
Now the big tampon companies are using a cotton/rayon blend for their products instead of the very dangerous super-absorbant materials!. The highest absorbancy per tampon is now 6 -15 grams of fluid compared to the 10 - 20 gram range they had achieved with the super-absorbants!.Www@Answer-Health@Com
Menstruating women are not the only people who can get TSS, men, children and women who are not having their periods sometimes get TSS for other reasons, but most TSS cases are found in women using tampons!. Women under 30, and especially women between 15 to 19 are at the most risk because they have not yet developed any resistance to the toxins!. Older women who have used tampons for years may develop some immunity because they have been exposed to small doses over time!.
What are its symptoms!?
- A high fever - over 102 degrees
- Nausea
- Vomiting
- Diarrhea
- Sore throat and aching muscles
- A rash that looks like sunburn, especially on the hands and feet
- Dizziness or fainting - a drop in blood pressure
If you have any of these symptoms while wearing a tampon take it out immediately and call a doctor!. Tell them you have been using tampons and you think you have TSS!.
The symptoms are very much like flu symptoms, so it might be tempting to just wait and see if its the flu, or if it will go away!. But if you are having your period and using tampons take these symptoms very seriously!. TSS moves so fast that an overnight delay could be fatal!.
What happens if you get TSS!?
The sooner you get treatment, the better!. TSS moves through your body quickly!. Your doctor can do a test to see if the bacteria is present in your vagina!. For a mild case of TSS, you might just have to go to bed and drink lots of fluids!. If its a severe case, you will have to be hospitalized!. Again, TSS can be fatal and needs serious attention!.
When TSS is in its advanced stages, it is a really ugly disease!. Until I started researching it, I thought that if you had bad TSS you just had a really high fever and went into a coma or something!. The truth is scary, but something you should know!.
Your blood pressure goes down, which puts your body into shock!. Your skin will shed, as if you have been badly burned!. You might experience respiratory failure (you can't breath for yourself) or kidney failure (your kidneys stop cleaning your blood)!. Because your blood is not circulating well, the cells in your fingers and toes (the parts of your body which are farthest away from your heart) will start to die from lack of oxygen, and if a lot of the cells die, you could loose parts of your fingers and toes, or entire fingers and toes!. This is the same kind of thing that happens when people get bad frostbite!.
The after effects of a case of TSS are serious too!. Women who have survived a bad case may loose their hair and fingernails, have double vision, headaches, deafness, or arthritis for months or even years!.
Now that you are scared to death!.!.!.
How Do You Prevent TSS!?
Obviously, you can choose not to wear tampons, or use other internal products like sea sponges!.
However, using tampons wisely can give you much better odds of staying healthy!. There are two things you should think about each time you use a tampon: its absorbancy (how much fluid it can hold) and length of time it will be in you!.
The more absorbant a tampon is, the more dangerous it is!. Some people think the reason for this is that more absorbant tampons are made of a blend of cotton and rayon!. Plain cotton seems to be safe, but artificial fibers like rayon have been known to cause trouble (see History, below)!.
Tampax's Original Regular are 100 percent cotton, and may be one of the safest big brand tampons you can wear!. Health food stores sell tampons100 percent cotton and also bleached in environmentally friendly ways!.
There are now charts on all tampon boxes which show the absorbancy levels of the different sizes of tampons!. Choose a tampon size that is the minimum that you need for your flow!. In other words, a super-plus tampon might be fine if you will bleed through it in a few hours, but a tampon shouldn't be used as a plug you can leave in all day long!.
Which leads me to the second important point:
Don't wear tampons for a long time!. The best thing to do is to alternate between using tampons and pads!. At the very least, use smaller tampons and change them more often!. Never go to bed wearing a tampon (wear a pad instead), or wear the same tampon all day long!. Now, if your flow is very light, you will notice that it is hard to change tampons because they are sort of dry!. This isn't very good for you either, so you might just want to wear a mini pad on those light days!.
By using lower absorbancy tampons, changing tampons frequently, and taking breaks from tampons at some point each day, you can make it very hard for that bacteria to cause you any trouble!. Remember, as a new tampon user, you have the least defenses against the bacteria, so try to be careful!.
The history of tampons and TSS
Tampons were invented in the 1930's, and at that time they were made of compressed cotton!. But they leaked when they were soaked through, so tampon manufactures began to experiment with materials which would make a better (more absorbant), tampon!. They found their answer in synthetic fibers!. Proctor & Gamble wanted to make a leak - proof tampon!. They succeeded by using a blend of synthetic fibers which included polyester sponges and chips of carboxy-methyl-cellulose!. They called their new tampon RELY and put it on store shelves in 1975!. This encouraged an "absorbancy race" among other tampon manufacturers!. So by 1980 the market was full of new super absorbant tampons!. Reports of TSS began to flood in during the spring and summer of 1980, and all tampon brands were implicated, but particularly RELY!. Somehow the swelling of the synthetic fibers made an ideal growing place for the bacteria!. Maybe it also was due to the the fact that women didn't change these tampons as much!.
By 1981 absorbancy was found to be the key risk factor in tampon related TSS!. Any high absorbancy tampon was proved to increase a woman's risk of getting TSS!. Playtex's Super Plus was deemed a "high risk" tampon!. Following the TSS breakout, Tambrands (makers of Tampax) reissued the safer all cotton Original Regular style, but retained super absorbant ingredients in its other models!.
In 1985 the family of Betty Ogilvie, a woman who had died from TSS, won their lawsuit against International Playtex!. They were awarded eleven million dollars, because the jury found that Playtex had shown reckless disregard for women's lives by continuing to make the super high abosorbancy tampons when it was known that they were a major cause of TSS!.
Now the big tampon companies are using a cotton/rayon blend for their products instead of the very dangerous super-absorbant materials!. The highest absorbancy per tampon is now 6 -15 grams of fluid compared to the 10 - 20 gram range they had achieved with the super-absorbants!.Www@Answer-Health@Com