What is disseminated histoplasmosis?
Disseminated histoplasmosis is a fungal infection that occurs after inhaling the spores of the fungus Histoplasma capsulatum. See also: Histoplasmosis.
Can disseminated histoplasmosis be cured?
For some people, the symptoms of histoplasmosis will go away without treatment. However, prescription antifungal medication is needed to treat severe histoplasmosis in the lungs, chronic histoplasmosis, and infections that have spread from the lungs to other parts of the body (disseminated histoplasmosis).
How common is disseminated histoplasmosis?
Disseminated disease occurs in approximately 1 in 2000 patients with acute infection. Most patients who develop disseminated histoplasmosis are immunosuppressed (eg, AIDS, solid organ transplantation, treatment with tumor necrosis factor-alpha inhibitors) or are at the extremes of age.
What are the clinical features of histoplasmosis?
Fever, headache, malaise, myalgia, abdominal pain, and chills are common symptoms; usually, histoplasmosis is self-limited. Individuals exposed to a large inoculum may develop severe dyspnea resulting from diffuse pulmonary involvement. Joint pain and skin lesions occur in 5-6% of patients, mostly in females.
What is a disseminated disease?
A disseminated infection is one in which a localized infection spreads (disseminates) from one area of the body to other organ systems. While there are systemic infections that can affect the entire body at once, doctors will reserve the term for those infections that are normally constrained to a specific site.
Is histoplasmosis contagious person to person?
Histoplasmosis is an infectious disease caused by inhaling the spores of a fungus called Histoplasma capsulatum. Histoplasmosis is not contagious; it cannot be transmitted from an infected person or animal to someone else.
Does histoplasmosis cause permanent lung damage?
The infection usually goes away with antifungal medication, but scarring inside the lung often remains. Histoplasmosis is unusual enough that if you develop it, your health care provider should check to find out whether another disease is weakening your immune system.
What does histoplasmosis do to the body?
In most cases, histoplasmosis causes mild flu-like symptoms that appear between 3 and 17 days after exposure to the fungus. These symptoms include fever, chills, headache, muscle aches, cough and chest discomfort. In these milder forms, most symptoms go away on their own in a few weeks.
Why histoplasmosis is called Darling’s disease?
The fungal infection either is cleared or the organism continues to reproduce intracellularly and disseminates throughout the body via lymphatic and hematogenous circulation. Darling, a world-leading pathologist discovered Histoplasmosis to be a fungal infection in 1905 therefore it is also called as Darling’s disease.
What is an example of a disseminated disease?
Examples of Disseminated Infection Sexually transmitted infections (STIs) can readily disseminate from the primary site (such as the genitals, anus, or mouth) to other parts of the body if left untreated. Some of the most serious forms include disseminated syphilis and gonorrhea.
How do viruses get disseminated?
Virus dissemination is a process of a Malicious software that attaches to other software that destroys the system of the victim. They disrupt the computer operation and affect the data store by modifying or deleting it.
Do masks protect against histoplasmosis?
Respirators provide varying levels of protection, and people have developed histoplasmosis after disturbing material contaminated with H. capsulatum despite wearing respirators that they assumed would protect them.