Severe West Nile Infection Could Lead To Lifetime Of Symptoms

ScienceDaily (Mar. 18, 2008) — Most people who suffer severe infection with West Nile virus still experience symptoms years after infection and many may continue to experience these symptoms for the rest of their lives according to research presented March 17 at the 2008 International Conference on Emerging Infectious Diseases in Atlanta, Georgia.

"What we are finding is that about 60% of people, one year after severe infection with West Nile, still report symptoms," says Kristy Murray of the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, a lead researcher on the study.

Supported by a grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), Murray and her colleagues have been conducting a long-term, in-depth study of people in the Houston, Texas area who have been diagnosed with West Nile. They monitored 108 patients over a 5-year period, checking in every 6 months to record both subjective and objective clinical outcomes and rates of recovery.

Persistent symptoms of West Nile infection still plagued 60% of patients in the study at the end of the first year. Moreover, Murray and her colleagues discovered that most, if not all, recovery appeared to take place in the first two years following infection.

"Once they hit two years it completely plateaus. If a patient has not recovered by that time, it is very likely the will never recover," says Murray. Appoximately 40% of patients in the study continued to experience symptoms 5 years after infection. Some long-term damage included memory loss, loss of balance and tremors.

Approximately 80 percent of people who are infected with West Nile do not experience symptoms. This study only included patients with symptoms, which can range from mild fatigue and weakness to seizures, paralysis and tremors. Half the patients experienced encephalitis due to infection and another third presented with meningitis. Murray and her colleagues noted a significant difference in recovery rates.

"Those patients with ecephalitis were less likely to recover than those who had meningitis or uncomplicated fever," says Murray.

Another outcome of severe West Nile infection was depression. At the one-year followup 31% of the patients reported new-onset depression. Using objective measurements, the researchers determined that 75% of those cases met the definition of clinical depression.

"West Nile virus infection can result in significant long-term clinical sequelae and cognitive and functional impairment, particularly in those who present with encephalitis," says Murray.

Scary thought for those of us who HAVE had severe West Nile virus infections...especially if they were stupid enough to try and tough out what they thought was a persistent flu until they wound up being taken by ambulance to the emergency room.

....hate to break this to you, but even if you show up the minute you think you've got West Nile viral symptoms there isn't anything they can do about it. Even the diagnosis isn't likely to be made within the first 7-8 days of having the disease.

It's a virus. So you get fluids, rest, a ventilator if you stop breathing and maybe some antibiotics if you develop pneumonia or waiting for the tests to come back.

What nobody says is the REAL point. .... Why don't we SPRAY for mosquitos anymore? Cause the idiots in charge of government are scared by the liberal environmental whack jobs.

Thanks to the libtards the UN has killed more Africans than any racist KKK member could have dreamed about. All by allowing some idiot to stop the spraying of DDT thereby causing MILLIONS of people to contract malaria. Same goes for West Nile, Equine encephalitis etc...... Just make sure that no mosquito is injured cause we wouldn't want that.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.