A woman who was experiencing forgetfulness and depression has had an 8cm-long parasitic roundworm removed from her brain.
The 64-year-old English woman, who was living in New South Wales, Australia, was admitted to hospital in January 2021 after three weeks of abdominal pain and diarrhoea, followed by a dry cough and night sweats.
By 2022, her symptoms had evolved to include forgetfulness and depression, prompting medical professionals to refer her to Canberra hospital.
An MRI scan of her brain revealed that a motile helminth – a parasitic roundworm – was living in the right frontal lobe lesion of her brain.
Surgical intervention became the only option, and doctors successfully removed the roundworm, which measured 8cm (80mm) in length and 1mm in diameter.
Identified as a third-stage larva of the Ophidascaris robertsi nematode species, the case is unprecedented in medical history, and has been documented in the journal of Emerging Infectious Diseases.
Typically, this parasitic worm lives in the digestive tracts of carpet pythons indigenous to the Australian state of New South Wales.
Medical professionals suspect the woman inadvertently ingested the worm’s eggs by eating edible grasses that were tainted with snake faeces, however, the actual cause cannot be confirmed.
After the eggs hatched within her body, medics believe the larvae embarked on a journey to her brain. This could have been influenced by the medication she was taking, which compromised her immune system.
“We hypothesised that she inadvertently consumed eggs either directly from the vegetation or indirectly by contamination of her hands or kitchen equipment,” the medics said.
An image of the woman’s brain showing the…
