Strep, then Mycoplasma, then something viral, then Bartonella. Every time you clear one, another shows up. We went looking for what was different about the kids who collect — and found something you can actually test for.
We looked at 38 children and 29,264 lab results from families in our own community, and compared kids whose basic immunoglobulin panel came back abnormal against those whose came back normal.
Same illness. Roughly double the rate of stacking.
Immunoglobulins are the antibodies that clear infections. If they are low or skewed, your child is not unlucky — their immune system is having trouble finishing the job. So things keep coming back, and new things keep landing.
It reframes the whack-a-mole. You are not failing to treat the infections. Something upstream is failing to clear them.
Only about two-thirds of the children in our data had ever had that panel run at all.
It is not an exotic test. IgG, IgA and IgM is a standard blood panel. Most pediatricians can order it. Insurance generally covers it.
Two things can come from it. If it is normal, you have ruled something out and you stop wondering. If it is abnormal, you finally have an explanation — and in some children it opens treatment doors that were closed before, because now there is documentation.
If a doctor pushes back on the pneumococcal titers, the reason to give is that it shows whether the child actually responds to vaccines already given — a functional deficiency a total IgG level can miss.
This is our own community data — 38 children — not a published study, and the numbers are small. These are families who came to us because their child is complicated, so rates run higher than the general population. We are not claiming causation.
We are telling you what we saw, because we would have wanted someone to tell us.
Want this answered for your own child? A Plan B synthesis reads every lab and note you have — together — and tells you what is driving the picture, what has never been checked, and what to ask for next.
The first one is free, and you keep the list either way. Phone photos of labs are fine.
Plan B for PANS is written by a parent, not a physician. Nothing here is medical advice or a substitute for your child's clinicians — it is meant to make you the best-informed person in the room when you talk to them.