A 40-year-old American man had a tapeworm removed from his brain. The parasite had caused neurocysticercosis, causing intense pain and violent vomiting. A rare and almost miraculous case, according to the doctors who operated on him.
The headaches had become so severe that the pain caused vomiting and intense sweating. For several months, Gerardo Moctezuma had also been suffering from increasingly marked drowsiness. But it was only when this 40-year-old Texan fainted without explanation during a football match last year that he decided to seek help. At Dell Seton Medical Center in Elgin, Texas, doctors perform an MRI and are shocked to discover a tapeworm (Taenia solium) of 3.8 cm located just next to the brainstem, at the base of the brainbrain.
Unnoticed for ten years
According to doctors, the man contracted the parasite more than 14 years ago, when he lived in Mexico before coming to the United States, by eating contaminated pork or being in contact with feces. It would have gone unnoticed for a decade before causing neurocysticercosis, an infection of the central nervous system caused by the pork tapeworm. THE cystcyst formed by the presence of the worm triggered a hydrocephalushydrocephalusan accumulation of liquidliquid spinal cord in the brain increasing the pressurepressure cranial.
It will take more than three hours for neurosurgeons to remove the worm from the brain: the operation requires opening the skullskull behind and navigate through a particularly sensitive area, where nervesnerves and essential vessels. But there was no other choice: “ If not treated quickly, this patient would certainly have died due to the enormous pressure in the brain “, explains Jordan Amadio, neurosurgeon at the Brain and Brain Institute. spinespine Ascent Seton, in Austin. Miraculously, the man recovered perfectly from the operation. Eight months after the intervention, “ he is happy, lives with his family and returns to work, » assures Jordan Amadio Washington Post.
In November 2019, a 43-year-old Chinese man was also infected with a Taenia solium of 12 centimeters lodged in his brain for 11 years, after contracting the parasiteparasite by eating undercooked pork, the most common cause of contaminationcontamination. A few months earlier, in March, it was an 18-year-old Indian boy who was admitted to hospital for a chest infection. T.solium. In his case, the number of cysts in his brain was unfortunately so high that he did not survive.
Neurocysticercosis, one of the leading causes of epilepsy worldwide
In the adult stage, the pork tapeworm remains in the intestine. It attaches to the mucous membranemucous membrane intestinal and develops there by feeding on nutrientsnutrients ingested by the host. It sometimes remains there for years without being detected. THE larvaelarvaeon the other hand, can pass into the blood circulation and reach different organs (muscles, skin, eyeseyes…), and lead to cysticercosis. Neurocysticercosis, which affects the central nervous systemcentral nervous system, is the most serious form; This is one of the most common causes ofepilepsyepilepsy in the world, according toWHOWHO. It can also lead to headachesheadaches chronic, blindness, meningitismeningitis or a dementiadementia. The disease mainly affects rural regions in Latin America, Southeast Asia and parts of sub-Saharan Africa, where humans are in contact with pig droppings on farms. Besides the surgerysurgery In the most serious cases, treatment, which is long and expensive, involves taking antiparasitic drugs such as praziquantel or albendazole.
To avoid any contamination, it is advisable to cook pork meat well, as the tapeworm is destroyed by a temperature above 60°C. Note that the tapeworm can also infect beef (Tapeworm saginata).
