EBV & Liver Damage: Understanding Mononucleosis Symptoms & Next Steps

Question
hi, how are you? I hope you can help me understand some things as the liver specialist doctor is on vacation on this site. around 3 weeks ago my boyfriend and i got sick we had very sore throats swollen glands that hurt our ears and white in the back of our throats he went to a doc at the hospital because he had a 103 fever. The doctor he went to said he has strep they didn't test for it just looked and then gave a prescription for amoxicillin every 8 hours 10 days. The following day I wen to different place the doctor they gave me the same but for 7 days only. I didn't have a high fever like he did I suppose that is why idk. Anyway we got better our throat got better and we seemed to feel a lot better we both took the meds completely. Then we started getting headaches and being very tired and nauseated. I felt better then he did  he started feeling really tired all the time and having headaches and sinus pain then he started feeling very nauseated and started having a fever of 101.6 a few times then he told me his pee looked brown. And then started very yellow with bright orange in the middle of the bowl and would switch from that to brown again. He couldn't eat so we went to the hospital because it was late. they did 3 urine tests and 3 blood test with like 7 viles and ten viles at a time checking everything. so today they cancelled out hepatitis and many other things looked like maybe 20 different tests. Well this doctor says he has MONO and we prob did have strep but his mono is attacking his liver. I don't drink or smoke he drinks and smokes. They are saying his liver isn't repairing itself so he is going for more tests. I asking you what your option is on this do you think they are right about what they are saying? its just the other doctors we saw for him at first didn't seem to know what they were doing and I am worried they are missing something. and also I big reason I am writting this is because he is french and I am english so we went to a english hospital and I had no idea what the doctor was saying really and I hope you can maybe explain what you think or if you have heard of things like this. Thank you so very much. Sincerely Tegan

Answer
T,

Yes, it sounds like mononucleosis (Epstein Barre Virus) infection that can look like strep throat as you can develop white plaques on tonsils w/ high fever.  Strep can be a concordant infection in about 60% of cases so antibiotic therapy is often administered, however the cillins (Amoxil, etc.) as a rash often develops when those antibiotics are used and can be confused with an allergic reaction.  That being said, Mono is caused by a virus that often attaches the liver and can cause an elevation in liver function tests (AST, ALT, bilirubin (which can cause urine to turn dark).  It can also affect the bone marrow and cause a reduction in platelets and anemia.  Recovery can be as long as six months.  Therapy is limited.  Some advocating antiviral therapy.  But I find the Myers cocktail with high dose Vit. C is very helpful and reduces lengthy convalescence and helps with recovery.  Follow up with tests of the liver and CBC.

Therapy should include at this point... High Dose Vit. C IV therapy and adaptogen herbs (Ginseng) and N-Acetyl-Cysteine orally (Glutathione IV)

JP/