Having an Iron infusion tomorrow and I'm scared.

Hello OH family, I am scared to death of having a reaction to an iron infusion tomorrow. My anxiety is peaking. I know the name of the Iron is called Infed. It will be my first ever iron infusion. I have had a lot of infusions before for other health conditions like IVIG and Nutritional ****tail infusion but I am really scared of an adverse reaction to Infed. I am hypersensitive to drugs. Has anyone here had one? If you have, would you tell me what to expect? Any severe joint pain? For instance with my IVIG-immunoglobulin...the doctor gave me pre-meds like Benadryl, Solumedrol, Tylenol and Dilauded. I have not spoken to my hematologist about my fear of pain. What do I do before I chicken out? Thanks in advance.

I'm assuming you've spoken to your hematologist about your drug sensitivities, so I'm sure they'll take good care of you.

As for your fear of pain, you can back out if you want to. But if your anemia is so bad that you need iron infusions, you are very close to all kinds of severe pain. It won't last long, but neither will you. With the infusion you'll feel lots better, and live a lot longer.

Thanks Grim Traveller!

I've had a few iron infusions and they were no big deal. The worst part this last time was the guilt I felt having an iron infusion while most of the other people there were having chemo. 

It really put  things in perspective for me.  My problems sure seemed pretty insignificant in light of the battle they were facing. 

I believe they gave me Benadryl before hand. I also had Infed and had no adverse effects afterwards and I felt a lot better, too. 

I had some iron infusions, and I had some mild side effects. But the benefits for me exceeds the mild discomfort. 

I had a mild pains and aches, plus gut discomfort. (cramps). 

They gave me IV  benadryl + steroids before iron to prevent any allergic reaction to the iron. 

Good Luck and be sure and let us know how you are doing

SOME people---a very, very FEW people---DO have bad reactions to iron infusions. That's why they generally do a very small 'test' infusion before they give you the good stuff. The one series of iron infusions I needed, they gave me IV Benadryl beforehand, and maybe something else. For ME, the only pain was the very minor pain of inserting the IV. The Benadryl kicked my butt, and I slept through most of them.

Okay, maybe the stick wasn't the ONLY pain---because the pre-treatment anxiety was pretty bad. But once I had the first one, I knew there was nothing to dread. Take a big, deep breath!