Doctors at a Canberra hospital in Australia found a live worm in a woman’s brain, The Guardian reported.
Neurosurgeon Dr Hari Priya Pandey took the hospital staff by surprise when he pulled out an 8cm worm from a patient.
A 64-year-old patient was admitted to a local hospital in New South Wales in late January 2021 with abdominal pain, diarrhea, persistent dry cough, fever and night sweats.
Symptoms including forgetfulness and depression worsened in 2022.
Later, he was admitted to Canberra Hospital, where an MRI scan of his brain revealed abnormalities that required surgery.
During the process, this discovery was made. Sanjaya Senanayake, an infectious disease doctor at the hospital, said neurosurgeons did not expect this to happen, noting that it was a “once-in-a-lifetime event”.
The medical team at the hospital held a meeting to find out the type of worm, but they could not identify it and it was sent to a specialist scientist who confirmed that it was an Opitascaris robertsii worm that lives in snakes.
British newspapers reported that this was the first case of the parasite being found in humans.
The patient lives near a lake in which a species of snake abounds. Senanayake said he had no direct contact with the snakes and was collecting herbs from the lake to use in cooking.
Doctors and scientists who examined her condition said that the worm may have reached her through the faeces of snakes in the grass.
Senanayake said, “He is the world’s first patient with a snake-borne worm disease and we thank him for his bravery.”
Senanayake, who said the patient is recovering well and is under constant medical observation, emphasized that his condition highlights the risk of animal-to-human transmission.
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