Finding The Cause of Your IC or Chronic UTI: DNA Next Generation Sequencing & Broth Culture

Hi there! I'm the Vancouver UTI Girl blog writer. I am based in Vancouver BC, Canada. I have had UTI symptoms since February 2018 for the last 4 months and I am searching for answers, even if it means searching beyond Canada.

I was on the LiveUTIFree.com website to search for answers for my never-ending chronic cystitis aka chronic UTI or bladder inflammation or interstitial cystitis or pelvic floor dysfunction. I don't have a solid diagnosis yet! I am tired of living in pain and frequency since February, so I have decided to be pro-active and do the following suggestions that I had read on that website. And oh boy, is this costing me a lot! But desperate times call for desperate measures when I'm not getting the pelvic healing I need in Canada.

•  I ordered a urology kit from MicroGenDX. Since I am not American-based, I had to pre-pay $200 USD upfront for it. This doesn't include the fee I will have to pay for shipping my sample back on overnight, which came out to about $83.00 Canadian. You will need a doctor who can sign the requisition form for it, and work with the lab teams. My GP refused because he said he didn't feel comfortable with it. Fair enough, I think some GPs don't want to deal with too much extra work, or worry they will get in trouble going outside the norm of their practice. My other GP also said she didn't want to sign them because she admitted she was not knowledgeable about the whole thing. But I was able to get Crossroads Naturopathic Clinic to sign off on it. The naturopaths at this clinic have the ability to prescribe antibiotics AND they are open to working with MicroGenDX and Aperiomics, so make sure you find a naturopath who can prescribe antibiotics. In addition to my naturopath, I'm also looking for a new GP and/or specialist (urologist, urogyn) who can understand chronic UTI and re-curring UTIs, even if it means traveling outside of my town.... or even my country! (Oct 2018 update: I eventually switched to working with Dr. Hsieh urologist and Ruth Kriz in the US, you can read about it in my newer posts)

• I ordered a urology kit from Aperiomics.com This costed me a hefty $950 USD to pre-pay as well since I'm not American based. That covered the shipping to and back. Again, my GPs refused to sign the requisition for it for the same reason I mentioned above. But I have found a naturopath in Vancouver, BC, Canada who does, after talking to Aperiomics and asking if they knew of any Vancouver BC doctors who have started an account with them. The naturopaths are from Crossroads Naturopathic Clinic and they were interested in Aperiomics' technology and already using them for another chronic UTI patient. As soon as I learned about that, I booked to work with Crossroads since I have the same problem as that other patient too (a UTI that just won't go away and keeps showing up negative in standard Canadian tests). But Aperiomics found the bacteria that was in that other patient's urine.

I decided to do both kits because I want to see the difference in both and the results I get from both. With Aperiomics and MicroGenDX, they don't require refrigeration. MicroGen DX uses vacuum sealed vials, and Aperiomics has a solution that you mix into your urine bottle. I haven't gotten my kits yet at the time of this writing. 

*** So if you have a general practitioner who is weary of DNA next generation sequencing or antibiotic therapy, you can look for a naturopath who can be open to this. I heard that Australian, UK and American family doctors are very open to this. But Canadian healthcare providers are still hesitant to accept medical technology outside of their country. I'm not sure if it's for political, financial, or pharmaceutical reasons... or something deeper in the practitioner industry that I don't know about. So if you find a naturopath who can sign the requisition for those, make sure that your naturopath / clinician / doctor is certified and has the authority to prescribe antibiotics. Even if your clinician isn't 100% knowledgeable about UTI or IC antibiotic therapy, the team at Aperiomics and MicroGen DX have pharmacists/doctors who discuss and guide your clinician on what to do. So your doctor only needs to follow their instructions.

There's another method called broth culture at United Medical Laboratories in Virgina, US. It goes for a bit under $500 USD. I decided not to do the broth culture because you have to keep the urine container cold via sending, and I'm worried the urine will spoil in the delivery process, or I might mess up on that since I'm all the way in Canada. If I lived close to this lab, I totally would have done the urine broth culture to see what bacteria they could find in my urine.

Also, I have booked in for 2 doctors mentioned on the LiveUTIFree site for the summer. There is 1 male urologist in Washington DC in the United States named Dr. Michael Hsieh, and 1 male urologist in London UK named Dr. James Malone-Lee who specialize in treating difficult chronic UTI infections. This will totally kill my wallet, and I'm dreading the plane flight with my urinary frequency, but I want to be working with a live person and get tested with them and work with preventing future UTIs, and also show them my test results from the 2 DNA next generation sequencing kits I am getting etc. Yes, I'm doing everything now - maybe overdoing it, BUT I'm tired of living in pain and frequency. It's my life and I decided to get pro-active about it, even if my country's medical practitioners frown on me for doing so. Hey, who's the one living in pain? Well, I am, not my medical practitioners! I will search for a way to get better and keep sharing it on this blog.

This is THE MOST EXPENSIVE UTI I'VE EVER GOTTEN!