Patient has WORM removed from his foot after mistaking itchy bulge for varicose vein

Patient has WORM removed from his foot after mistaking itchy bulge for varicose vein

Mangalore Today News Network

Apr 12, 2016: The 42-year-old had first noticed the strange rash, which seemed to move up to a couple of centimetres a day, after returning from a holiday in Nigeria

A man who developed an bizarre itchy rash in his foot that seemed to move was shocked to discover he had a worm living under his skin.

The patient went to doctors a month after first spotting what looked like a varicose vein in the side of his foot.

The 42-year-old had first noticed the strange object, which seemed to move up to a couple of centimetres a day, after returning from a holiday in Nigeria.

Medics at the Peking Union Medical College, in Beijing, examined his foot and found a red, raised tract with a wavy margin.

They told the patient he had a cutanteous larva migrans, a parasitic skin infection caused by hookworm larvae, living in his foot.

Normally found in the intestines of household pets, hookworms lay their eggs in the faeces of their hosts.

They can be picked up by humans who come into contact with the eggs while walking barefoot on the beach or on contaminated soil.

The parasite, which is confined to the epidermis as it cannot break through to lower layers of skin, is normally seen in on the feet, back, buttocks, thighs, or abdomen.

 Doctors, who published their research in the New England Journal of Medicine , said the patient later made a complete recovery.

Cutaneous larva migrans is the most frequent skin disease among travellers returning from tropical countries, according to a paper in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases.

The best way to avoid infection is to ban dogs from beaches, the authors said.