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The itch that just wouldn't stop
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| MrJiveBoJingles |
COR version: Interesting New Yorker story about the physiology and neurology of itching, centering around a woman who had an itch that was apparently caused by something going wrong in her brain, not by anything happening to her skin -- an itch so bad that she eventually scratched all the way into her brain as she was sleeping.
:nervous:
| quote: | One day, she went to see a doctor because she wasn’t feeling well, and learned that she had contracted H.I.V. from a contaminated needle. She had to leave her job. She lost visiting rights with her children. And she developed complications from the H.I.V., including shingles, which caused painful, blistering sores across her scalp and forehead. With treatment, though, her H.I.V. was brought under control. At thirty-six, she entered rehab, dropped the boyfriend, and kicked the drugs. She had two good, quiet years in which she began rebuilding her life. Then she got the itch.
It was right after a shingles episode. The blisters and the pain responded, as they usually did, to acyclovir, an antiviral medication. But this time the area of the scalp that was involved became numb, and the pain was replaced by a constant, relentless itch. She felt it mainly on the right side of her head. It crawled along her scalp, and no matter how much she scratched it would not go away. “I felt like my inner self, like my brain itself, was itching,” she says. And it took over her life just as she was starting to get it back.
Her internist didn’t know what to make of the problem. Itching is an extraordinarily common symptom. All kinds of dermatological conditions can cause it: allergic reactions, bacterial or fungal infections, skin cancer, psoriasis, dandruff, scabies, lice, poison ivy, sun damage, or just dry skin. Creams and makeup can cause itch, too. But M. used ordinary shampoo and soap, no creams. And when the doctor examined M.’s scalp she discovered nothing abnormal—no rash, no redness, no scaling, no thickening, no fungus, no parasites. All she saw was scratch marks.
...One morning, after she was awakened by her bedside alarm, she sat up and, she recalled, “this fluid came down my face, this greenish liquid.” She pressed a square of gauze to her head and went to see her doctor again. M. showed the doctor the fluid on the dressing. The doctor looked closely at the wound. She shined a light on it and in M.’s eyes. Then she walked out of the room and called an ambulance. Only in the Emergency Department at Massachusetts General Hospital, after the doctors started swarming, and one told her she needed surgery now, did M. learn what had happened. She had scratched through her skull during the night—and all the way into her brain. |
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/...currentPage=all |
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| smakmagik |
| quote: | Originally posted by MrJiveBoJingles
“this fluid came down my face, this greenish liquid.” |
:wtf: |
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| Gauss |
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| noikeee |
| useless-fact-that-i-really-didn't-need-to-know of the day. |
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| pkcRAISTLIN |
| how does one scratch through bone with their bare hand? |
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| nchs09 |
| quote: | Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN
how does one scratch through bone with their bare hand? |
Scratching. |
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| Gauss |
| quote: | Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN
how does one scratch through bone with their bare hand? |
I was wondering the same thing... Wouldn't she expend her nails before reaching the brain? |
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| cmay119 |
| quote: | Originally posted by MrJiveBoJingles
COR version: Interesting New Yorker story about the physiology and neurology of itching, centering around a woman who had an itch that was apparently caused by something going wrong in her brain, not by anything happening to her skin -- an itch so bad that she eventually scratched all the way into her brain as she was sleeping.
:nervous:
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/...currentPage=all |
Is there an end to this story? Did she survive the brain trauma? :wtf: |
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| Ygrene |
| quote: | Originally posted by pkcRAISTLIN
how does one scratch through bone with their bare hand? |
By letting the Batman ride do all the work. Worst joke I've ever made. |
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| pkcRAISTLIN |
| quote: | Originally posted by Ygrene
By letting the Batman ride do all the work. Worst joke I've ever made. |
you've been itching to say that haven't you? |
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