Yaasmeen Castanada, 19, has been diagnosed with Stevens-Johnson Syndrome, a rare, life-threatening drug reaction that causes death in up to 25% of adults who get it.
Victor Joe, director of the burn center at the University of California-Irvine Medical Center, where Castanada is being treated, says that while her chance of survival is strong, her treatment is delicate because the condition causes the top layer of the skin to die and shed, creating blisters and open wounds.
Doctors have wrapped Castanada's body in a special dressing that adheres to the open wounds and allows the skin to heal without having to remove bandages to clean the wounds.
The condition has ravaged her. Joe says 65% of her body, including her arms, hands and torso, has been affected. He says she is on a ventilator, under sedation and on painkillers. He says doctors are giving her medication intravenously to block the cells that are attacking her skin.
She's wearing special contact lenses to protect her eyes, which are losing their protective membrane. The worry, Joe says, is that she can get scarring in her corneas, which could lead to permanent blindness.
Patients with this ailment can experience problems with taste, swallowing, eyesight and sexual functions if they lose skin in the mouth, esophagus, eye and genital areas, he says.
In Castanada's case, he says that because she is progressing well, she could be out of the hospital as soon as two or three weeks.
He says her example "is a cautionary tale" for people to resist the temptation to take a pill for every ailment.
Castanada's fight for her life began on Thanksgiving Day.
Castanada, a sophomore at California State University-Los Angeles where she studies civil engineering, and mother of a 4-month-old girl, had cold symptoms and a sore throat, says her mother, Laura Corona. So she took an antibiotic called bactrim that was offered by a friend. Bactrim is often used to treat urinary tract infections, ear infections and bronchitis.
As the night went on, the teen's eyes and throat began to burn, her eyes and lips turned red and she was rushed to the hospital, her mother said. Castanada was hospitalized right away and within four days, her entire back was full of blisters, Corona says.
Last Friday, Dec. 5, Castanada had surgery on the top part of her body, and hospital staff members scraped the skin to encourage new growth, her mother says.
"She's been in a lot of pain," says Corona, who has spent every night with her daughter in the hospital. "And I can't do anything for her.
"I never heard of this before," she says. "It can happen with any medication, even over-the-counter medicine. We just don't know what our bodies are allergic to."
While Castanada has health insurance through her mother, who is a special education assistant in an elementary school, the family has started an online fundraiser (gofundme.com/yaasmeencastanada) to help with medical costs and long-term recovery therapy not covered by insurance. It has raised more than $13,000.
Stevens-Johnson Syndrome is a rare, extreme reaction to medication or an infection, according to information from the Mayo Clinic. It can begin with flu-like symptoms but results in the top layer of skin dying and shedding.
"It can be considered sort of a burn from the inside out," physician Lawrence Matt, a dermatologist in Santa Monica, Calif., told ABC News.
Corona advises not taking someone else's medications and being aware of your allergies. In the meantime, she says, she and her daughter are taking it one day at at time.
"She's looking good," Corona says. "I'm hopeful."
Contributing: Melanie Eversley
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