Meningitis survivor encourages vaccination

MISSION — Jamie Schanbaum, 21, lost her legs and fingers to bacterial meningitis two years ago.

She has scars all over her body.

But she counts herself as lucky.

She didn’t have kidney failure or have to take 30 pills a day like other meningococcal meningitis survivors.

She did not die.

“I’m lucky. I just have physical disabilities” Schanbaum said.

Schanbaum was diagnosed with the disease in November 2008 while attending the University of Texas in Austin.

She was spending the night at a friend’s house where she was studying for an exam.

Schanbaum started throwing up one night. When she went to the bathroom and stepped on the tile, she felt freezing cold.

The next morning, she could hardly walk herself to the emergency room and asked for a wheelchair when she got there.

Meningococcal disease can be difficult to recognize, especially in its early stages, because its symptoms are similar to those of more common viral illnesses. But meningococcal disease can cause death or disability within just a day, according to the website Voices of Meningitis.

Schanbaum testified Wednesday in front of more than 300 school nurses during a School Nurse Educational Conference in Mission. She lives in Austin, but her mother, Patsy Schanbaum, is from Brownsville.

“People ask me what happened to my hands,” said Jamie, whose is missing all her fingers except for very small portions of her thumbs.

“I tell them meningitis, and they say, ‘I did not know that meningitis could do that to you,’” she said. “Well, now they know.”

“I recommend people to get vaccinated,” Jamie said.

A state law requires all students living in college dormitories to get vaccinated; it is also a requirement for seventh- and eighth-graders in Texas middle schools and is recommended for children ages 11 and older.

Jamie was living off campus in 2008 and had not received the vaccine. She finally got vaccinated after getting the disease, but doctors tell her she still could get another form of meningitis.

“If God really hated me, I still could get the disease again,” she said.

There are five types of meningitis, her mother pointed out.

“She could get sick again with any of the other four,” Patsy said. “The vaccine only protects you from four of the five types.”

Jamie has been out of the hospital for a year now. She has prosthetic legs and is able to walk and drive. She uses what is left of her thumbs to do what is necessary in her everyday life.

“Everything is like so new to me,” she said. “Touching my hair, putting on my clothes, makeup — everything is so new.”

Jamie was depressed after the amputations but is now looking for a publisher for a book she plans to write about her experience. She is back in school, travels to talk about meningitis and just got a bike and plans to participate in the Paralympics.

There are many cases of meningitis at universities all over the country. In the Rio Grande Valley, however, just one case has been identified in two years, said Dr. Brian Smith, director of the Texas Department of State Health Services region that includes the Valley.

“The problem is not that it is very common,” he said. “(It) is that it is just a severe disease when it does happen. And since we can prevent it, it is very, very good to get the vaccine.”

The University of Texas-Pan American only requires students living in the dorms to be vaccinated.

South Texas College has no dorms, so it suggests that its students get vaccinated but does not require it, said Michelle Balani, a spokeswoman for the institution.

The state health department plans to screen the schools in the Valley to confirm if seventh- and eighth-graders are complying with the vaccination requirement.

The Hidalgo County Health Department has six clinics where low-income students can get the meningococcal vaccine for free.

Common activities can contribute to the spread of meningococcal disease. Anything that makes teens feel run down — even something as simple as staying out late — may also put them at greater risk for meningitis by weakening their immune systems.

Jamie still does not know how she got infected.

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Martha L. Hernández covers Mission, western Hidalgo County and general assignments for The Monitor. You can reach her at (956) 683-4846.