Symptoms of cysticercosis depend on the location and size of the cysts, and can range from no symptoms at all to tender lumps under the skin to headaches, seizures, stroke or death.
Brain scans revealed swelling and three lesions in his brain — both of which are typical of a parasitic infection known as neurocysticercosis, which can cause seizures and headaches and sometimes lead to death.
If your doctor confirms you have a tapeworm infection, follow their instructions to lessen the risk of complications. If left untreated, there's the risk of developing an invasive infection which can affect your tissue and organs. This can lead to brain swelling, inflammation, and intestinal blockage.
Invasive infection
If tapeworm larvae have migrated out of your intestines and formed cysts in other tissues, they can eventually cause organ and tissue damage, resulting in: Headaches. Cystic masses or lumps. Allergic reactions to the larvae.
This infection occurs after a person swallows tapeworm eggs. The larvae get into tissues such as muscle and brain, and form cysts there (these are called cysticerci). When cysts are found in the brain, the condition is called neurocysticercosis.
Left untreated, adult tapeworms can live in a host body for up to 30 years. Their length varies, but they can grow to be anywhere from 6 to 22 feet.
Doctors in India were stunned to remove a tapeworm measuring more than 6 feet through a patient's mouth, according to a report published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Although tapeworms in humans usually cause few symptoms and are easily treated, they can sometimes cause serious, life-threatening problems. That's why it's important to recognize the symptoms and know how to protect yourself and your family.
Not usually. In fact, a tapeworm is more likely to make you lose your appetite. That's because the worm can irritate your bowels when it attaches to them with its circular suckers (and, in some cases, its movable hooks).
To diagnose a tapeworm infection, doctors will collect and examine a stool sample on 3 different days to check for tapeworm eggs or pieces of worm. They may also do a blood test. If a child could have cysticercosis, the doctor might recommend a CT (CAT) scan or MRI of the brain or other organs to look for cysts.
Management and Treatment
You can easily kill tapeworms with anthelmintic drugs, including praziquantel (Biltricide®), albendazole (Albenza®) and nitazoxanide (Alinia®). Healthcare providers usually recommend praziquantel because it also paralyzes the worm, forcing it to dislodge from your intestinal wall.
The Spirometra tapeworm can live in humans for up to 20 years. A man in China experienced seizures and other mysterious symptoms for years before doctors finally found the cause: He had a rare parasite living in his brain, which had likely been there for more than a decade, according to news reports.
Some people with tapeworm infections never need treatment, for the tapeworm exits the body on its own. Others don't realize they have it because they have no symptoms. However, if you're diagnosed with intestinal tapeworm infection, medication will likely be prescribed to get rid of it.
Once ingested, cysticerci attach to the small intestine and develop into adult tapeworms over the course of 2 months. The adult tapeworms produce proglottids that mature, detach, and migrate to the anus and are then passed in the feces.
Adult tapeworms may measure 4-28 inches in length. As the tapeworm matures inside the intestine, these segments (proglottids) break off and pass into the stool.
And, technically, this parasitic infection, called taeniasis, does cause weight loss. “Tapeworms will cause you to lose weight because you have this huge worm in your intestines eating your food,” Quinlisk says.
After treatment, the tapeworm dies and is usually digested within the intestine, so worm segments do not usually pass into the stool.
If they are well and eating / drinking / urinating / deafecating / breathing normally, then you don't need to present as an emergency.
These parasitic worms feed on partially digested food in the intestines. Some sources state that tapeworms delight in sugar, so avoiding foods high in sugar is widely recommended if you suspect you have an infection.
Taenia solium is an intestinal parasite and may be excreted in feces in infected patients but our case is unique, as an asymptomatic child sneezed out the proglottids of the parasite from his nose.
In general, the mode of tapeworm transmission from pet to person is due to close physical contact such as allowing a pet to lick you or letting it sleep on your bed which causes accidental ingestion of the tapeworm eggs.
Anyone who has a tapeworm will need medical treatment to get rid of it. Treatment is about 95% effective and typically takes a few days.