Introduction
Whipple's disease is a rare multi system infectious disease that often affects any system in the body including the stomach, small intestines and central nervous system.
Whipple’s disease a bacterial disease that can result in neurological or intestinal damage, which depends on how serious or severe signs or symptoms are. If a person is diagnosed with Whipple’s disease many types of treatments may be used to cure the infection, but if left untreated or misdiagnosed it can result in death. Other complications may develop as well as recurrence after treatment. Scientists are yet to determine how this rare disease is transmitted to humans.
What is Whipple’s Disease?
Whipple’s disease discovered in 1907 by American Pathologist George Whipple (1878-1976) is a fatal rare bacterial infectious disease, that mainly affects the bowels. Whipple disease also known as intestinal lipodystrophy is found mainly in men over thirty (30) years; it can be digestive or bacterial and affects the intestines as well as other parts of the body. The Mayo Clinic.com article (2008) states “whipple’s disease interferes with normal digestion impairing the breakdown of foods such as fats and carbohydrates and hampering your body’s ability to absorb nutrients.”
This mal-absorption disease is a condition that prevents the intestines from absorbing nutrients. Since the intestine is unable to break down fatty foods other parts of the body like the heart, lungs, brain, joints, eyes and skin are later infected.
Causes
“There is no eviden...
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...ly but over a period of time depending on the severity of Whipple’s disease. “Your doctor may check your progress with the PCR test to see if any of the disease-causing bacteria are left. However, you will still need to take antibiotics for 1-2 years to prevent relapse of the disease” Symptoms may return the body may begin to resist the drug, weight loss as well as nutritional deficiencies may occur.
Conclusion
I believe that through out history the world has been plagued with many types of rare infectious diseases that have baffled scientists to date. Many of these diseases are serious and can even be life threatening if untreated. Although Whipple’s disease is rare, and occasional deaths continue to be reported, (due to a large part to late diagnosis and delayed treatment) but with early detection and proper treatment and this disease can be curable.
Lupus is inflammatory disease caused when the immune system attacks its own tissues and organs, and this inflammation affects many different body parts such as the joints, skin, kidneys, blood cells, brain, heart and lungs. Second is the Celiac disease and it is an autoimmune reaction from eating gluten, and it may lead to damage in the small intestine because this disease attacks the villi, the projections that line the small intestine for protection. The last example is Rheumatoid Arthritis, an inflammatory disorder in which affects many joints, mainly in hands and feet, and then causing your joints to painfully swell and possibly cause bone erosion.
Shigella flexneri, a facultative anaerobe belonging to the family Enterobacteriaceae, is a Gram-negative rod that is the causative agent of diarrhea and dysentery in humans. Potentially life-threatening, S. flexneri's effects include bacteremia, hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS) and toxic megacolon (4). The principle disease of diarrhea and dysentery caused by this pathogen is known as shigellosis. 10-100 organisms are sufficient to cause disease, and transmission is generally from person-to-person by way of fecal-oral (2). Shigellosis can be characterized as a disease with over 60% incidence in children ages 1-5 (6).
...oms that come along with it. There is a possibility that the disease will be transmitted to the offspring of the infected person. Having a splenectmomy conducted will not cure the disease it will only make it go into remission.
Clostridium difficile infection often causes a disease known as pseudomembranous colitis. It is an inflammation of the intestine caused by Toxin A and B. Cell death and fluid accumulation stimulate the release of histamine and this causes inflammation. It is characterized by foul smelling diarrhea, abdominal pain, and fever. Complications that may arise include dehydration due to loss of water and electrolytes caused by excessive diarrhea, toxic megacolon, and in extreme cases death.2
Crohn’s disease can affect any part of the gastrointestinal tract, from the mouth to the anus, but it most commonly affects the end of the small bowel (the ileum) and the beginning of the colon. It can simultaneously involve different areas of the gastrointestinal tract with alternating diseased segments with normal segments. Crohn’s disease involves the full thickness of the bowel wall and can be complicated by fistulas and abscesses. Crohn’s disease may also have granuloma cells which is called granulomatous enteritis or granulomatous colitis (Warner & Barto, 2007).
This disease affects the muscles in the intestines. It can cause gas, abdominal pain, diarrhea and constipation. It usually does not lead to further diseases. Most people can control the symptoms through diet, stress management and medication.
Necrotizing fasciitis, known commonly known as "flesh eating bacteria [infection]", occurs in a wide range of people 1. It occurs in the elderly, middle aged and younger patients. It occurs in athletes and debilitated individuals. It can occur in drug abusers with self inflicted wounds and healthy individuals with incidental injuries. It may occur in those with metabolic disorders such as diabetes and those with suppressed immune systems. It may occur in those with no underlying disorders and no known particular injury. It occurs under ordinary circumstances such as a seemingly harmless cut or scrape and in wounds resulting from major trauma such as an auto accident.
Baumgart, Daniel C. , and William J. Sandborn. "Crohn's Disease." The Lancet Volume 380: 1590-1605. Web. 12 May 2014.
Crohn's disease is the generic name for regional enteritis, which is a type of Irritable Bowel Disease. The initial onset of this disease is between the ages of 15 to 30 years old with about 4 out of 1000 people being affected (CDC, 2014). The CDC (2014) also states that the United States has a “1.7 billon dollar” annual financial burden resulting from ”700,000 physician visits, 100,000 hospitalizations, and disability in 119,000 patients” yearly. There is presently no cure for Crohn's, although certain medications and treatments have been proven to take the disease into remission. Crohn’s disease is a realitivly new disease, without a cure, than can be controlled and let the patient live a normal life.
Hers, H. G. "a- Glucosidase Deficiency in Generalized Glycogen-Storage Disease (Pompe's Disease)." Biochem J (1963): 11-16.
globally spread. The symptoms of this illness are quite defined and are very recognizable. Cause
Diseases can be defeated or endured, if they are embraced. Denied or feared, they can grow and make it drudgery for scientists to manage. For years, South African mortality rates have escalated due to the phenomenon of antibiotic resistance.
Crohn’s disease is a disease that causes inflammation, swelling, and irritation to any part of the digestive tract which is also known as the gastrointestinal tract or GI tract. The disease most commonly targets the ileum which is a part in the small intestine. The digestive tract is organs that connect your mouth to your anus and it releases hormones and enzymes for the digestion in food. The inflammation caused by the disease goes deep into the lining of the digestive tract. It creates a stricture in the small intestine which is a narrowing of the pathway that can slow the movement of food through the intestine. The stricture can then move to large intestine which can cause many problems for absorption. When the disease causes the intestine to swell it can also be very problematic because the large intestine wouldn’t be able to function properly. Crohn’s disease is considered as an inflammatory bowel disease.
In the 1960s, doctors in the United States predicted that infectious diseases were in decline. US surgeon Dr. William H. Stewart told the nation that it had already seen most of the frontiers in the field of contagious disease. Epidemiology seemed destined to become a scientific backwater (Karlen 1995, 3). Although people thought that this particular field was gradually dying, it wasn’t. A lot more of it was destined to come. By the late 1980s, it became clear that people’s initial belief of infectious diseases declining needed to be qualified, as a host of new diseases emerged to infect human beings (Smallman & Brown, 2011).With the current trends, the epidemics and pandemics we have faced have created a very chaotic and unreliable future for mankind. As of today, it has really been difficult to prevent global epidemics and pandemics. Although the cases may be different from one state to another, the challenges we all face are all interconnected in this globalized world.
Gastroenteritis, sometimes referred to as infectious diarrhoea is a common disease that affects millions of people annually. It is a disease caused by viruses, bacteria or parasites that enter the human body and spread, which induce symptoms such as vomiting, diarrhoea, abdominal pain and nausea. Although it is a common occurrence in society and is usually not harmful, cases of gastroenteritis in less developed countries may have more fatal repercussions due to their inability to access ample means of treatment. Over time, as more research was conducted into the disease, scientific developments were made to aid those affected by gastroenteritis and reduce the number of fatalities by educating people regarding preventative methods.