Did Girl's Dip In The Ocean Cause Her To End Up In Intensive Care?
HUNTINGTON BEACH (CBSLA.com) — An Orange County high school student remains in the hospital Wednesday.
CBS2's Michele Gile said the girl has been hospitalized for nine days and has been in and out of intensive care.
Some of her doctors believe a simple dip in ocean water at Huntington Beach nearly killed her.
A day after swimming in the regional lifeguard competition in Huntington Beach last month, 16-year-old Julianne Bartz became violently ill.
She was ultimately hospitalized with a very serious form of pneumonia.
Wednesday outside of Children's Hospital in Orange County, Catherine Bartz says an infectious-disease doctor has just discovered that her otherwise healthy daughter was exposed to a strep bacteria that is contracted orally.
"It's a very, serious complicated pneumonia," says Catherine. "They call it complicated pneumonia. It was life-threatening,"
Bartz wonders if a sewage spill a few days earlier in Los Angeles that closed beaches as far south as Seal Beach could be to blame.
"So, the infectious-disease doctor," says Catherine, "was finally able to get a culture ... and one of the first things she asked us was if she had been swimming. And that's when the light kinda came on. She had been very, very healthy up until the day she did that regional competition where she was in the ocean for so long. And in the back of my mind, it had always been a question."
Julianne is now out of ICU but had a second surgery Tuesday to drain fluid from her chest.
Orange County health officials take ocean water samples at more than 100 locations each week. A small section of Huntington State Beach near the lifeguard competition was closed for elevated bacteria levels the day before junior guards hit the water.
But experts stress they can never say exactly how a swimmer or surfer becomes infected with a particular bacteria.
Heal the Bay environmentalists warn summer is a more dangerous time because the water is warmer.