The Puffer Forum

Has anyone gotten sick after cleaning their tanks? Yesterday was WC day for all my FW tanks. Felt great til 4pm, then started feeling sick. By 6pm, I had a temp of 103.3 & couldn't get it below 102 the rest of the night. Now it's normal. Hubby blames the tanks. Not sure I should go see the doc or not.

Never felt sick after cleaning, heard some horror stories about people picking up fish TB though (paranoid yet ). Made myself sick after rubbing spices into a raw chicken breast though - spices tasted much better than the bile that came later!

Pufferpunk wrote:Has anyone gotten sick after cleaning their tanks? Yesterday was WC day for all my FW tanks. Felt great til 4pm, then started feeling sick. By 6pm, I had a temp of 103.3 & couldn't get it below 102 the rest of the night. Now it's normal. Hubby blames the tanks. Not sure I should go see the doc or not.

Sounds more like the flu, given the time of year and the rate of turn from feeling fine to fever leads me to believe that is was. I had the flu before one day where I was fine at noon, and over 100F fever by 6pm. Most infections from fish-tanks are likely to be sores or wound infections from broken skin.

Dr gave me Tamiflu.

Hope you make a speedy recovery, I would be 99% sure it's not fish tank related

I hope not! After flooding the basement 2x this week, hubby is saying I should rethink my hobby.

Experienced and knowledgeable hobbyists rarely get sick from their tanks. As you fit both of those descriptions, I would be shocked if you got something from your tanks. New fish in QT, especially from Asian sources, are potential sources of some dysentery conditions, but even those are uncommon if reasonable care is taken (such as not eating or drinking w/o washing your hands well after tank contact), but again avoidance is pretty easy. Fish TB is always a possibility, but it is thankfully rare other than for immuno-suppressed individuals who should take extra precautions.

Floods are all too common, especially for folks like me who operate complex multi-tank assemblies. My friend who operates the LFS swears that he still does not understand my systems... and even if he did he would not set up such w/o multiple floor drains - which I cannot have here (radon area). There is always at least one wet/dry vac at hand, and they do get used pretty commonly.

If you do not drink tank water, or submerge fresh scrapes or cuts in tanks, you are unlikely to catch something from your tanks.

Pufferpunk wrote:I hope not! After flooding the basement 2x this week, hubby is saying I should rethink my hobby.

Tell him you were thinking the same thing and that you guys should probably just turn the entire basement into a large tank to keep further floods from happening.

We are considering moving south. I told him, when/if we do, the fishroom goes into the basement.

Last year, I kept getting fevers often, for no apparent reason, I'd be fine for a few days & then get another one. Often it would happen every night, around 6pm & then I'd be fine in the morning. When I saw the Dr yesterday about the fever, he just said it was the flu (I've NEVER had the flu) & gave me a script for Tamiflu. I took one when I got home but it's obvious to me it was another one of my fever episodes, NOT the flu, so I'm not taking anymore pills for that. I worry that if this could continue into my older years, with the fever getting that high...

Yeah likely a bad coincidence.

Do you trust your doctor? Is the Dr. associated with a teaching hospital? Your area has some good ones.

loyola. I do not trust his knowledge 100% but I'm not sure what they could test for, when I can finally see a Dr the fever is gone.

I doubt it was the tanks.

For a high fever to come and go like that sounds like a virus to me.

Any chronic illnesses that could mess with your thermoregulation? Any weird light exposure or anything like that? I know that when I work nights around 2am I will be freezing my butt off. Probably has something to do with my circadian rhythm but I can easily be shivering with a winter coat on and another one draped across my legs. Sometimes I even add a blanket and I am still freezing.

What I would do is start measuring my temperature several times a day, maybe every 4 hours. Keep a journal. Take that in to a doctor so they can see the pattern and seek a second opinion as well.

IDK... It's been getting up close to 100 every night now.