Age: 59.0
Sex: M
Vaccine: PPV, PPV
Symptoms: Blood test, Demyelinating polyneuropathy, Fall, Gait disturbance, Guillain-Barre syndrome
Clinical narrative: This spontaneous report as received from a consumer refers to her husband, a 59 year old male patient with high cholesterol. The patient's medical history included appendectomy at the age of 18. The reporter stated that the patient had been "very healthy all his life". He was "working out six days a week and on the seventh, he would bicycle for three hours". He was in the "best shape of his life". It was also reported that the patient had never been in the hospital or been sick. On 04-AUG-2016, the patient was vaccinated with a dose of PNEUMOVAX 23 injection, lot number reported as L048264, expiration date: 10-JUN-2017, (dose, dose number, injection site and route of administration were not provided). Concomitant therapies included gemfibrozil for high cholesterol. On the evening of 05-AUG-2016, the patient developed "bilateral shooting pains that went from his back to his buttocks and down into his thighs" and were only experienced "at night". It was also stated that the patient couldn't sleep. On 08-AUG-2016, the patient sought medical attention via visiting the emergency room at the local hospital where he was prescribed an unspecified pain medication. After experiencing the shooting pain for "about three weeks, he also began to get progressively weaker". "He was unable to climb steps or go up the curb". He began to "fall at home and in public". The patient went to the emergency room again on 04-SEP-2016 and was admitted to the hospital where he spent thirteen days as an inpatient (until approximately 16-SEP-2016). When the patient was admitted into the hospital he was weak, but could still walk. During the thirteen day hospital stay, the patient got progressively worse and at an unspecified time during this hospital stay, was "unable to bear his own weight". The hospital "still did not know what is wrong with the patient" at the date of his discharge. The patient's diagnostics studies included unspecified blood work, 3 spinal taps, multiple magnetic resonance imaging scans (MRI) of the lower back, bone marrow biopsy and lymph, however no results were provided at the time of this report. The diagnosis at discharge with which the patient left the hospital stated that he experienced "progressive bilateral lower extremity weakness suspected secondary to acute inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy". The patient was transferred directly from the hospital to an unspecified "skilled nursing facility for rehabilitation". The patient's "endurance was bad at the time of discharge", so he was unable to go to an acute care rehabilitation center. As of the date of this report, the patient was still not walking and was still in the unspecified skilled nursing facility where he was receiving one hour of physical therapy daily. According to the reporter, the goal for the patient while in the skilled nursing facility was to increase his endurance so he can be transferred to an acute care rehabilitation center to receive more extensive rehabilitation. The outcome of gait disturbance, asthenia, weight bearing difficulty, Guillain-Barre syndrome and abasia was reported as not recovered/not resolved. The outcome of fall, back pain, insomnia, pain in extremity and musculoskeletal pain was unknown. The relatedness between the events and suspect therapy was not provided. No product quality complaint (PQC) was involved. Upon internal review, the events of gait disturbance, Guillain-Barre syndrome and abasia were considered to be medically significant. Additional information has been requested.