![]() While she had no direct contact with snakes, scientists hypothesize that she consumed the eggs from the vegetation or her contaminated hands.Ĭopyright 2023 The Associated Press. The woman lives near a carpet python habitat and forages for native vegetation called warrigal greens to cook. The life cycle continues as other snakes eat the mammals. The worms’ eggs are commonly shed in snake droppings which contaminate grass eaten by small mammals. “She's done OK, but obviously because this is a new infection, we're keeping a close eye on her,” Senanayake told Ten Network television. The patient had been sent home soon after the surgery with antiparasitic drugs and had not returned to hospital since, Senanayake said. Six months after the worm was removed, the patient’s neuropsychiatric symptoms had improved but persisted, the journal article said. “She was so grateful to have an answer for what had been causing her trouble for so very long,” Bandi said. She and everyone in that operating theater were absolutely stunned,” Senanayake added.īandi said her patient regained conscious after the worm was extracted without any negative consequences. ![]() “Suddenly, with her (Bandi’s) forceps, she’s picking up this thing that’s wriggling. for what was a mystery illness that we thought ultimately was a immunological condition because we hadn’t been able to find a parasite before and then out of nowhere, this big lump appeared in the frontal part of her brain,” Senanayake said. ![]() Senanayake said the brain biopsy was expected to reveal a cancer or an abscess. Scans showed changes in her brain.Ī year earlier, she had been admitted to her local hospital in southeast New South Wales state with symptoms including abdominal pain, diarrhea, a dry cough and night sweats. The woman had been admitted to the hospital after experiencing forgetfulness and worsening depression over three months. We’ve just removed a live worm from this patient’s brain,'” Senanayake said. “I got a call saying: ‘We’ve got a patient with an infection problem. Senanayake said he was on duty at the hospital in June last year when the worm was found. The worms are commonly found in carpet pythons.īandi and Canberra infectious diseases physician Sanjaya Senanayake are authors of an article about the extraordinary medical case published in the latest edition of the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases. The creature was the larva of an Australian native roundworm not previously known to be a human parasite, named Ophidascaris robertsi. We all felt a bit sick,” Bandi added of her operating team. But it’s alive and moving,’” Bandi was quoted Tuesday in The Canberra Times newspaper. "I just thought: ‘What is that? It doesn’t make any sense. Surgeon Hari Priya Bandi was performing a biopsy through a hole in the 64-year-old patient’s skull at Canberra Hospital last year when she used forceps to pull out the parasite, which measured 8 centimeters, or 3 inches. CANBERRA – A neurosurgeon investigating a woman’s mystery symptoms in an Australian hospital says she plucked a wriggling worm from the patient’s brain.
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