It's Not a Tumor - Doctors Find Worm In Woman's Brain Instead

FoxNews.com ^ | Thursday, November 20, 2008

[Joiseydude]

Doctors in Arizona thought a Phoenix-area woman had a possible brain tumor, but it turned out there was something else penetrating her brain – a worm.

Rosemary Alvarez started experiencing numbness in her arm and blurred vision. She went to the emergency room twice and had a cat scan, but everything came up clear, MyFOXPhoenix.com reported.

It wasn’t until doctors took a closer look at an MRI that they discovered something very disturbing.

“Once we saw the MRI we realized this is something not good,” neurosurgeon, Dr. Peter Nakaji told the news station. “It's something down in her brain stem which is as deep in the brain as you can be.”

Alvarez was wheeled into surgery where Nakaji and his colleagues were expecting to remove a tumor, but they uncovered a worm instead.

[17th Miss Regt]

Ewww! Yuck!

[omega4179]

Better that than a Tumor.

[SouthDixie]

Thank you for no pics.

[Vaquero]

Its Not a Tumor!

[Notwithstanding]

I guess brain worms is endemic among democratics.

[Bertram3]

What kind of worm was it?

[668 - Neighbor of the Beast]

they said it could come from eating undercooked pork

More bacon. The world needs more bacon.

[ScottinVA]

Now that is unsettling. Wonder how it happened?

[cajungirl]

My guess is trichonella since it came from pork

[Paleo Conservative]

Ewww! Yuck!

It gets worse. Does this mean she didn't wash her hands before?

Alvarez said she hopes people learn this lesson from her story.

“Wash your hands, wash your hands.”

[Lancey Howard]

Heh. This reminds me of a very old TV show (Twilight Zone? Outer Limits?) in which a guy had a worm boring its way through his brain from one ear to the other. Through the whole show the guy was in excruciating pain.

At the end, the worm emerged from the other ear and the pain finally subsided. The doctor came into the guy’s room and told him the good news was that the worm had emerged. The bad news was that it was a female and had laid eggs in the center of his brain.

[Porterville]

It is pretty common to get worms around the world... but how did it get into her head?

[egannacht]

The report states that worms enter humans through undercooked meat, particularly pork. But the greater danger of contracting worms is through contact between people that REFUSE TO WASH THEIR HANDS after going to the bathroom.

I hate seeing guys come out from a stall, smelling up the place, and washing hands with just water, or worse walking out the door. The problem is compounded when the guy will go back to the kitchen, or sit down with their family to eat.

I read little kids are also in danger of getting worms from being little kids, by not knowing that eating dirty things or not cleaning hands results in worm transmittal.

Let's Remember: Don't Eat With Dirty Hands!

[listenhillary]

But it was only fantasy.
The wall was too high, as you can see.
No matter how he tried he could not break free.
And the worms ate into his brain.

Pink Floyd

[therut]

I have never forgotton that show. It think of it over the years. It was so unnerving. Actually the guy was an a22hole and he wanted to have someone killed. Somehow by mistake the worm got put where it crawled into his brain. Payback in you know what.

[theDentist]

"Well, we can always just go fishing...."

[Elle Bee]

you beat me to it

I wouldn't be surprised to see it on a story board soon

.

[Cincinatus]

That was "Rod Serling's Night Gallery." The episode was called "The Caterpillar"

[Lx]

That episode freaked me out as a kid big time. Thanks for the memories.

The funny thing was, the guy had paid some to put the earwig in someone else’s ear but the guy screwed up, Karma.