The dangerous polio virus , which causes spinal paralysis (also known as Heine-Medina disease), affects the gray matter of the spinal cord and the motor nuclei of the brain stem. This ailment leads to deformation of the limbs and partial immobilization. Let's get acquainted with general information about this disease. After all, the symptoms of polio need to know even now, in the age of vaccination.
How does infection happen?
The virus enters the body through dirty hands. The incubation period lasts up to three weeks. During this time, the virus multiplies in the thickness of the oral mucosa and the gastrointestinal tract. At this time, the symptoms of polio do not appear, but the person is the carrier and can infect other people throughout this period. Some patients experience damage to the nervous system at this time. Most infected people feel the first symptoms of poliomyelitis only at the end of the incubation period, when the virus enters the lymphatic system, and then into the blood. Further, the pathogen appears in the nervous system, crossing the blood-brain barrier. That is why the disease in question is so dangerous for children. After all, affecting the nervous system, it interferes with normal development. The most vulnerable child is up to four years. Immediately vaccinated (the first - at the age of three months), and then revaccination of poliomyelitis today can prevent the disease, leading to disability. But before this disease was one of the most terrible ailments of an infectious nature.
Symptoms of polio
There are several forms of this disease. They vary greatly in severity. There is a failed polio - in the event that the body's immune response destroys the pathogen in the incubation phase. The nonparalytic form is initial. She is characterized by general malaise, a slight increase in temperature, dyspeptic symptoms, muscle and headaches. All these manifestations disappear in a couple of weeks and can later develop into a paralytic form. The latter is the most difficult and carries the most terrible consequences. Immediately after the end of the incubation period, cramps and characteristic pains appear, because of them muscle weakness occurs . In the future, this form of polio progresses dramatically. Sluggishness builds up, reflexes become first elevated, and then disappear. Patients complain of convulsions and paresthesias (impaired limb sensitivity, numbness, tingling). Partial
paralysis of the arms and legs occurs for several weeks, and then passes, leaving significant deformities and atrophy. Many who become ill with polio subsequently become disabled.
It is also necessary to mention the meningeal, spinal, encephalitic, dull and bulbar forms of poliomyelitis. The latter is characterized by a high mortality rate.
Treatment
There is still no specific cure for poliomyelitis. Patients are isolated in a hospital for up to forty days. At this time, affected limbs are symptomatically treated. During the recovery period, much time is devoted to physiotherapy exercises, massage.