Children's disease mumps - a disease whose consequences may not be childish. Is this really so? This question quite often torments moms and dads of male children who had to be ill with such an unpleasant ailment. So it will be useful to find out at least a little if there is any connection between this terrible mumps and the same terrifying infertility for those families where boys grow up. The disease, popularly referred to as mumps (the consequences are likely), is called epidemic mumps in medicine. This is a viral disease, and this virus has a close kinship with a virus such as the flu. It can be transmitted in the usual way by airborne droplets, however, the mumps virus quickly dies in the usual environment, preventing it from spreading as widely as the flu, and turning into an epidemic. But still, at low temperatures, the dangerous mumps virus can be in an active state for quite some time, which leads to the rapid spread of this disease in the cold. As a rule, mumps mainly affects children from 2 to 14 years old, but cases of possible infection in a pregnant woman of the fetus are not excluded. Somewhere one and a half times more often boys suffer from this disease than girls, and, however, as with many other childhood diseases, its course is much more difficult when the patient is older.
Mumps (illness) effects can be quite unpleasant. You can get it from toys, dishes, other objects, but, however, these cases are much less common than in direct contact with the patient. But nevertheless, which gives us many reasons to assume that the consequences of mumps in boys can be associated with the impossibility of reproductive function and infertility? It is believed that yes, because the mumps virus is able to quickly move in the body, stubbornly localizing in different places, including in the testes. Having fixed itself here, the virus is able to give complications, which is called orchitis, very often ending in infertility.
Mumps alone is not very dangerous, although rather unpleasant, since the salivary glands are ignited, while causing acute pain. But this stops and does not entail particularly tragic consequences, which cannot be said about the complications that are associated with possible infertility. The scrotum swells with orchitis, and the affected testicle may increase in size. Such a patient is subject to mandatory and urgent hospitalization. This complication usually immediately becomes noticeable to the parents of the child, because the tumor and redness that begins in the boy on one testicle are actively able to pass after 2-3 days and the second. The temperature of the body increases sufficiently, and the general condition is most often poor.
Often, experts, when they answer the question whether there is a connection between male infertility and mumps, say that independent improper treatment often leads to almost 100% inability to have children in the future. So it is extremely important to follow in this case all the prescriptions of the doctor, use only those drugs that were offered to them. In this case, even a slight overheating of the testicles is extremely dangerous, so doctors sometimes recommend using cool compresses that are applied to the body. In most cases, orchitis leads to infertility, so the health of the child should be taken seriously. But there is no need to panic, making independent premature conclusions that the boy who had been ill with orchitis will not be able to unequivocally become a father afterwards. Treatment and proper care in many cases give a positive result, and then the mumps (illness), the consequences of which could be worse, does not become the cause of male infertility.
Mumps (disease): consequences in boys
The consequences of this disease, as mentioned above, can be quite deplorable, so the main thing is, for any signs of mumps, consult a specialist who will prescribe a good, adequate treatment. Why is it dangerous for boys? This is due to the fact that mumps can often affect the spermatogenic epithelium in the testes, and this can, in turn, lead to infertility. Unfortunately, boys are more affected by this disease than girls. And the consequences for them are more dangerous.