Contents:
- Medical Video: Don't Ignore These Early Symptoms of Parasites in Your Body
- What is flatworm infection?
- This type of worm causes flatworm infections in humans
- What causes flatworm infections?
- Symptoms of flatworm infection
- What treatment is right for flatworm infections?
- When to see a doctor?
Medical Video: Don't Ignore These Early Symptoms of Parasites in Your Body
Water is an important element that is always needed in life. But be careful, not all water sources are clean. Unclean water can be a source of various infections, including flatworm infections or worms. What are the causes, symptoms and treatment? Here's the review.
What is flatworm infection?
Worms are actually a general term for all types of infections due to worms. Well, one type of intestinal worms is flatworm infection, also called schistosomiasis. Flatworm infection is a disease caused by worm parasites that attach to human skin and then enter the body and develop in the blood. This worm infection is commonly found in areas without clean water sources.
Many people get scistosomiasis infection because they make direct contact with water that has been contaminated with worm larvae from freshwater snails. Therefore, this disease is also known as snail fever. This infection can attack several parts of the body such as the lungs, spinal cord, brain, and liver.
Scistosomiasis is actually preventable and indirectly fatal. However, if it is not immediately treated it can cause serious organ damage. Even worse, when attacking children it can lead to problems with children's growth and cognitive development.
This type of worm causes flatworm infections in humans
There are various types of schistosomiasis that can infect humans, namely:
- Schistosomiasis mansoni and schistosomiasis intercalatum attack human intestinal organs.
- Schistosomiasis haematobium causes bladder or urine scistosomiasis.
- Schistosomiasis japonicum and schistosomiasis mekongi causes intestinal schistosomiasis which mostly attacks Asians.
What causes flatworm infections?
As previously explained, a person can be infected with schistosomiasis if he has direct contact with water contaminated with worm parasites released from the body of a freshwater snail.
The cycle starts with people with flatworm infections who urinate or defecate in clean water, then make the water contaminated with worm parasites. If the species of freshwater snail is in water, then the worm eggs will enter the body of the snail and multiply. Then the worm parasites that come out of the snail's body through water can easily pollute the water.
Water that looks clean even though it has been infected with worm eggs is then used for human needs such as bathing, washing, swimming, and for consumption. Furthermore, the egg parasite enters the human body through the skin and enters the bloodstream.
The worm breeding process takes several weeks. In the human body, worm parasites travel through the blood vessels of the lungs, liver, then enter the blood vessels around the intestine and bladder.
After a few weeks, the worms begin to grow up and do marriages to produce many eggs which then spread in the organs in the body. Finally, the worms come out of the human body through urination and large bowel movements. And so on the life cycle of flatworms.
Symptoms of flatworm infection
First infected with flatworms, not everyone feels the symptoms. Symptoms of schistosomiasis depend on the type of worm and the stage of infection. The signs of this infection will only appear within a few days, even in other cases only seen in a matter of months.
The initial symptoms seen within a few hours or days after infection with flatworms are itching and rashes on the skin. This can last for approximately seven days.
About 3-8 weeks after being infected, patients may experience further symptoms such as:
- Fever
- Shivering
- Limp and weak body
- Cough that doesn't go away and accompanied by shortness of breath
- Muscle ache
- Stomach ache
- Diarrhea
- Urine or stool looks bloody
- Pain when urinating
- Weight loss
- Enlargement of the liver or spleen
Children infected with scistosomiasis can be anemic and malnourished. If not given treatment, the possibility of bad can cause spasms and swelling in the spinal cord.
What treatment is right for flatworm infections?
Currently the drug used to treat flatworm infections is praziquantel. However, this treatment is only effective against adult worms, does not apply to worm eggs. The dose for this drug is adjusted to the patient's body weight, usually two doses for one day.
This drug can help treat infections, even when the patient has reached an advanced stage. This drug is effective as long as there has been no damage or complications, but it cannot prevent the return of infection.
Other drugs such as oxamniquine, metrifonate, and artemisin have also been used, but in some people they do not show effective results such as prazequantel.
When to see a doctor?
When you realize that you have made contact with a water source contaminated with flatworms, then show signs of health, it is recommended to seek medical treatment immediately. The doctor will examine the causes of infection in your body, so that you can immediately be given appropriate help and treatment.
