My doctor didn't express concern that the infection I have is the antibiotic-resistant staph bacteria MRSA, so I don't think I need to entirely lose sleep over that. But sometimes I wake up with awful headaches, all of them occurring right between my eyes and occasionally near my eyebrows too. This indicates to me that I'm having sinus headaches, but I have never heard of a staph infection in the sinuses (the nose, yes, but not the sinus cavities). I also have what feels like eye strain - the area aorund my eyes feels a little bit sore, which I know is also a sign of a sinus infection. My vision is fine.

I was on an antibiotic called Augmentin for two weeks and it knocked my headaches out for a while, but they returned about three weeks later. During my period of no headaches, I finished the round of Augmentin and was put on another antibiotic called Bactrim. I have no idea if this stuff is even helping me because I still have bad headaches. I cannot return to my doctor for another two months because I've since returned to college in a city where I have no doctor.

I am trying to remain calm because I have been looking up the symptoms of staph infections and I keep getting results back of MRSA symptoms. I have noticed that the symptoms, aside from things like rashes and fever associated with MRSA, are more or less the same for any staph infection. I have the headaches, I have the fatigue, and I have what I think is chest pain not associated with heart problems (the pain is more under my armpit than dead center in my chest).

I have another week or two on the Bactrim, so I'll see what happens.

Dark Stranger -

You are worrying yourself needlessly. There is absolutely no reason to think that you have MRSA. If you haven't been hospitalized recently, the likelihood of your being exposed to MRSA is very small. There are many different forms of staph infection. There is no reason to think that you have the MRSA form. If your doctor cultured your sinuses and came up with "staph", he would have been told then that it was MRSA. It wasn't. (How do I know? Because you were treated with Augmentin. A different antibiotic would have been used if it were MRSA).

You're also assuming that the antibiotics you've used haven't worked. I think you're wrong there. It sounds like the Augmentin worked. You were symptom free for a time. Your infection may have not been completely cured (sinus infections typically take longer to respond to antibiotics than do other infections), OR it may have been cured and then returned, OR your headaches may not even be sinus related.

I just saw your most recent post so hopefully you have already stopped worrying!