Leukocytes found in my urine??

[jen74]

Hi gals.
Boy, I am not doing well. I have a nasty respitory virus right now and also woke up feeling like I may be getting yet another UTI. I just got over taking antibitoics for a UTI last week. I had a culture done three days after I started the antibiotics and it cleared the infection. How could I get another one so fast.
I talked to the nurse a few minutes ago and she said that my urinalysis showed some bacteria (luekocytes). The doctor does not want to treat me yet though, she wants to see what the culture says first. So I have to wait until Monday or Tuesday as it takes three days for a culture. She did say to call the doctor and have her paged over the weekend if I should get worse though.
What are leukocytes? Does this always indicate an infection? I know that I got rid of the last infection I had a couple weeks ago as my culture was clear after that. How could I get another infection so fast? I am very clean, and do not even have Sex bacause of all the pain I have. Could this indicate a kidney disease or something? I am really worried.
Jen

[humpieumpumkin]

Those little buggers are white blood cells I think! I almost always have them even without infection. This is bad for me b/c my uro always throws me on anti before he gets the culture back. This is bad in my case but good in most cases like for someone without ic. Anti's actually irratate my bladder and only take them if my culture comes back postive. Then I get a flare. Well I think your uro is a smart cookie. I think others would disagree though. We are all different, and my uro thinks i'm a idiot because I swear it makes me worse. I do take it though if I do have and infection.

Erika

[mich2604]

I have had this too in my urine. I also have high WBC. One of my dr says infection my uro says wbc is normal is IC. i just dunno. before IC things were a bit easier, if i had WBC dr said infection and antibiotic helped my lower back pain(only UTI symptom i got pre IC)

IC complicates things.

[jen74]

Thanks for replying. When the nurse called she said they found I think small amounts of bacteria in the urine, and when I asked her what kind of bacteria, she said she did not know, that the urinalysis only shows certain things, but only a culture can show what kind of bacteria there is. Then she said there was luekocytes in my urine. I wonder why the doc would not want to treat it if there was any bacteria. I did the clean catch method so I used the sterile wipey to clean well before I peed. I guess I will have to wait until Monday or Tuesday and hope I dont get worse over the weekend. I just cant see how I could get another infection so fast in less than two weeks after I just over the last one. And I did get over the last one because I had a culture three days after starting the anti-b's and it was clear at that time. What could cause repeated infections with the same bacteria?
Jen

[Sarojini]

Leukocytes are white blood cells. They do increase when you have an infection, but they increase whenever there is inflammation -- if you are having a really bad flare you can have leukocytes present with NO bacteria. Your culture will tell you which of these you are experiencing.