She thought she had cancer, but she actually had a brain-eating amoeba

This is a false diagnosis that seems extremely unlikely. An eating amoeba instead of cancer… that’s what happened to a woman in China.

In 2022, a 77-year-old patient is admitted to the hospital for… “Dizziness, confusion and slurred speech for several days. Doctors thought she had a brain tumor because the scan showed a lesion.” explains this Daily mailreporting a case study published in a scientific journal Helion.

Read also: Doctors give her a year to live, and she discovers that she is cancer-free after all

The woman died a few days later

A spinal tap, in which a needle is inserted into the spine to collect and analyze the cerebrospinal fluid there, revealed that the patient was infected with the virus. Balamutia mandrilaris, “A single-celled organism that spreads to the brain and kills nine out of ten patients.”

The woman spent eight days in the hospital. “becomes increasingly confused and increasingly unable to speak”, media reports. Over the next few days, her airway became blocked and she had to be put on a ventilator. “Despite aggressive therapeutic measures, the patient’s condition worsened”, write to the doctors. The patient died after her family decided to stop treatment.

What is a brain-eating amoeba?

Balamutia mandrilaris, a species of amoeba, was discovered in 1986, and only 200 cases have been reported worldwide, 100 of them in the United States. “Once in the bloodstream, the amoeba travels to the brain, where it causes granulomatous amoebic encephalitis.”

The first symptoms are fever, headache, vomiting, lethargy and nausea. “However, over weeks and months, the disease can cause seizures, weakness, confusion, partial paralysis, and difficulty speaking and walking.”– the media further clarifies.