Why doesn't a blood test show elevated White Cell count even tho a person's body is full of infection?

Question

I was admitted to a hospital in terrible stomach pain. They took blood several times and the white count was normal. They then did emergency surgery and found I was full of infection and had to have a hesterectomy and appendectomy. I also had a blood test about 2 weeks earlier at the office as routine and nothing showed up there. Dr. had no explaination of why this would happen. Does anyone know anything about this?

The surgery was exploritory as I was in so much pain they didn't know what to do. Everything was infected. Overies, Appendics my whole stomach cavity so they choose to remove everything. The appendics wasn't burst but badly infected.

THey said that all was normal. I am having symptoms of sore aching joints and very poor circulation in my toes and aching legs and arms. The surgery was several years ago. They took new blood test Arthritis panel for these current symptoms and said the blood tests were normal

Answer 1

I agree with what the previous answer said

However, to answer your question hypothetically, the only realistic way in which the body will not marshall a WBC response against systemic infection is if you are in an immunocompromised state (i.e. you have HIV/AIDS, or are on high-dose corticosteroids), you have a severe disorder of the blood cell precursors in the marrow, or it is a severe viral infection, against which a WBC response is not as strong.

Answer 2

It seems highly unlikely, since HIV generally causes a DROP in white blood cell counts. A rise in them seems to indicate an infection, and blood in the urine suggests it is probably a urinary tract infection. Since the doctor has taken these tests, he will probably investigate the source of this and give you some antibiotics if it is appropriate. A more important question is, why are you worried it is HIV? Do you have any reason to suspect you might be HIV positive? If so, why don't you have an HIV test? Having a test is not a big deal at all, and it will set your mind at rest. Many STI clinics offer walk in anonymous appointments which will give you the results in 15 minutes. I was tested for HIV earlier this year (I had massively swollen glands for ages that didn't go down) and it really wasn't this big scary deal everyone imagines it to be.

Answer 3

Initially, your WBC was probably really high but with such a severe infection your body may not be able to continue producing the numbers of white cells needed to fight off the infection and the numbers start to decrease. There will be a period when this fall-off will show up in the normal range before it dips even farther into a condition of low WBC. Theoretically, you were at a point between high and low or after the initial fall-off your body was able to continue to produce just enough to be within the normal range. Such false normals can give the illusion everything is fine even when the body is seriously ill.

Answer 4

first what i didn't understand is the cause of doing surgery. hysterectomy is not the treatment for infection of uterus. and no one will take out your uterus when your are having appendicitis. i mean if it was appendicits they would have done only appendicectomy but not hysterectomy. but if you had some problem [ i quote not infection] in uterus like fibroid in the uterus or ovarian cyst or torsion of the ovarian cytst then they go for hysterectomy. and while doing hysterectomy they must have taken out normal appendix which is done in some part of the world. in such case the white cell count will be normal which is there in your case.

Answer 5

in chronic infections sometimes the wbc count will be normal

Answer 6

If you gave us the diagnosis made by the pathologist, we could better try to answer your question.