In the world there are a huge variety of various human diseases, but only some of them are extremely rare. Some of them, mostly highly infectious, have virtually disappeared thanks to the efforts of medicine. The rest are genetic diseases, usually incurable. The rarest disease makes a person adapt to life. Consider the most unusual diseases.
Polio
Thanks to compulsory vaccination, now it is an extremely rare viral disease. Mostly sick in developing countries with poor medicine. The polio virus infects the motor neurons of the spinal cord, which leads to muscle atrophy and flaccid paralysis. It proceeds with high fever, extremely high mortality.
Most survivors remain disabled for life. Treating rare diseases like polio is a rather complicated process. It’s easier to prevent disease.
Progeria
It is a rare genetic disease, manifested in unnaturally rapid aging of the body. Distinguish between childhood and adult variants of the disease. Statistics report one case in four million. The pathology of the disease repeats the picture of natural aging, but accelerated many times over.
Sick children in a year of life age immediately for 10-15 years. Such rare diseases bring a lot of troubles. You can see photos of patients in this article.
The first symptoms of childhood progeria become noticeable by the second or third year of the baby’s life. At this time, the child stops growing, his skin is thinning, his head is greatly enlarged. Progeria of adults debuts at the age of 30-40 years.
Fields Disease
Perhaps the rarest disease in the world. In the entire history of medicine, one such case has been described with two patients. Sick minor sisters twin by the name of Fields, who live in England.
The disease manifests itself by a gradual loss of control over voluntary movements due to a defect in muscle tissue. As the disease progresses, patients increasingly depend on the help of others and a wheelchair, completely lose their ability to move independently.
Progressive Fibrodysplasia (Munich Disease)
The disease is extremely rare, statistics say one case in two million. It is based on a genetic mutation leading to congenital developmental pathologies. It is manifested by the curvature of the fingers and toes, spine and other bone disorders. This disease is characterized by unnatural proliferation of bone tissue, degeneration of soft tissues into bone. Any injury gives an impetus to the formation of a focal point for the growth of new bones.
It is very difficult when rare diseases of people appear in this way. The photo shows what a sick person looks like.
Doctors have not yet come up with a way to cure patients. Surgical removal of bone tumors leads to the opposite result, stimulating new growth areas. These rarest diseases scare, but patients try to live.
Kuru's disease
Extremely rare, but very dangerous contagious disease. Infectious agent - prions, which are proteins with irregular spatial structure. Once in the body, the prion moves to the brain. There, an infectious agent disrupts the spatial structure of neighboring proteins, leading to programmed cell death. And in the place of dead nerve cells, voids are formed - vacuoles.
The disease is accompanied by severe disorders of the nervous system and inevitably leads to death. Kuru was common in New Guinea among the cannibal tribes, and infection occurred after the ritual eating of the human brain. At present, cannibalism has almost come to naught, and the number of new diseases is extremely small. It’s good that such rare diseases are rare. Look for a list and description of the rest in the article below.
Microcephaly
This disease is characterized by a disproportionately small skull in the newborn. Small brain mass leads to severe mental failure, an irreversible developmental delay. Babies born with such a pathology usually survive, but remain idiots, and at best imbeciles or morons.
The main factor contributing to the birth of a sick child is the exposure of a pregnant woman to radiation, as well as genetic factors. Such rare diseases of children require a lot of courage and patience from parents.
Morgellon's disease
In the first place skin symptoms: ulcers, elastic living threads crawling under the skin. At the same time, memory begins to suffer, the psyche of patients, dramatically reduced performance.
Official medicine tends to be skeptical of patients' complaints, explaining them with mental disorders, and skin manifestations with various kinds of dermatitis. Particularly suggestible and hysterical patients are believed to be susceptible to disease.
Paraneoplastic pemphigus
Despite the fact that ordinary pemphigus is a fairly common disease, a small number of patients suffer from pemphigus, which is based on the paraneoplastic process. The disease is extremely dangerous and potentially fatal. A particular difficulty in the proper diagnosis and treatment is the differential diagnosis with ordinary pemphigus. At the heart of the disease is the current malignant process.
Skin manifestations of the disease consist in the appearance of blisters on the mucous membranes and skin, which, bursting, become a hotbed of pathogenic bacteria. Many patients die from sepsis or cancer. The rarest diseases are practically untreatable. People are forced to suffer and experience not only physical, but also moral pain.
Stendhal syndrome
This mental disorder manifests itself when the patient visits exhibitions and museums where art objects are displayed. It manifests itself in the form of anxiety, dizziness and high blood pressure. In some cases, hallucinations are even possible.
The syndrome was officially recognized in 1972, after the Italian psychiatrist Magerini described many similar cases of this disease among tourists visiting exhibitions and museums. In some patients, such reactions are caused by listening to classical music.
Exploding head syndrome
The disease is characterized by auditory hallucinations, patients hear different noises and explosions in their heads. As a rule, such phenomena occur in preparation for sleep or during sleep, as well as immediately after waking up. Auditory hallucinations are also accompanied by vegetovascular changes, in patients blood pressure rises, sweating intensifies. In some cases, in addition to acoustic effects, visual effects are also observed in the form of a beam of bright light.
Scientists suggest that the impetus for the disease is stress and prolonged overstrain of the mental sphere. Most often, middle-aged and elderly women get sick. Effective treatment of the disease has not yet been developed, due to its rarity. Patients are advised to eat fully, devote more time to walking and not overwork.
The Fallacy of Kapgrass
Mental deviation, manifested in the persistent conviction of patients that their spouses were replaced by a clone. Patients refuse to share housing with a "stranger." According to researchers, the disease in the bulk is caused by damage to the right hemisphere of the brain. Sometimes the disease manifests itself after an overdose of drugs.
Such rare diseases are very scary. They are rare, but they bring a lot of pain to the sick themselves and their loved ones.
Blashko lines
Skin syndrome is named after the German dermatologist Alfred Blaschko, who described the first cases of the disease. Blashko lines are a pattern of stripes and curls programmed in the genome of each person. Normally, these lines are invisible, but begin to appear with some endocrinological disorders. Sick babies are born with visible stripes.
Micropsy
Neurological disorder, manifested in a distortion of visual perception. Patients perceive objects of the surrounding world reduced by several times, incorrectly assess the distance between objects.
The disease violates not only visual perception, but also touch and hearing. The patient may not even recognize his body. Organic brain damage or drug use leads to microlepsy. Such a rare disease creates many problems for a sick person.
Blue skin syndrome
The skin becomes blue or purple, which generally does not affect the state of health, but negatively affects the appearance. The disease is genetic and inherited. It’s hard for people to be in society, because they are constantly paying attention to the environment.
Klein-Levin Syndrome
A neurological disease, also known as sleeping beauty disease. Patients experience pathological drowsiness, their daily routine is completely broken. They spend almost all the time in a dream, and wake up only to eat and go to the toilet. Also, patients complain of poor memory, hallucinations and react sharply to noise stimuli.
Most patients are adolescents in whom the disease is paroxysmal. The attack occurs once every few months, and lasts a couple of days, after which the teenager returns to normal life. With growing up, the disease usually recedes. It is good when very rare diseases leave a person after growing up.
Living corpse syndrome
Mental disturbance, manifested in the persistent conviction of the patient that he is already dead. Considering themselves to be a corpse, sick people can smell rotting flesh and see worms crawling through their bodies. Very often, patients commit suicide because they are unable to withstand nightmare visions.
Happy Puppet Syndrome or Angelman Syndrome
This is a genetic disease caused by a mutation in one of the chromosomes. A sick child grows poorly, he is tormented by attacks of causeless laughter. The limbs do not listen well, tremble or twitch. When walking, the legs bend poorly, resembling the puppet's gait, which led to the name of the syndrome.
Despite the fact that patients are mentally retarded, they manage to learn to speak a few words, and to understand a little more by ear.
Porphyria (vampire disease)
As a result of a genetic malfunction, the skin of patients is extremely sensitive to ultraviolet radiation. From sunlight, the skin begins to itch, burst, becomes covered with weeping ulcers and scars. Inflammation affects not only the surface of the skin, but also cartilage. The auricles, nose and nails, which become like the claws of an animal, are bent.
Patients prefer to leave their homes at night when there is no sun. Rare diseases of people cause discomfort in patients and the people who surround them. But at the same time it is very important not to despair.
Cipa
A genetic disease in which there is no sensitivity to pain, as a result of which patients do not notice bruises, wounds, cuts. Frostbite and burns are possible. Patients who have such a rare disease should constantly monitor the environment and plan their every move.
Mermaid syndrome
This genetic malfunction is manifested by a physical flaw in which children are born with spliced legs. In addition, in infants there is a pathology of the development of internal organs, which leads to high mortality.
The rarest diseases in the world are always shocking. Especially if pathologies are manifested from birth.
Pica
Mental disturbance, manifested by perverse taste preferences. Patients eat completely inedible and sometimes dangerous objects. In the stomachs of patients, they most often find:
- land;
- ash;
- rubbish;
- rubber
- buttons.
Researchers believe that in this way the body is trying to make up for the lack of minerals. These rare diseases of people require regular monitoring by close family members.
Hyperreflexia
Patients react violently to a sudden loud sound. An autonomic reaction includes increased sweating, increased heart rate, and high blood pressure. The patient can literally jump up from fright.
The condition is stopped with sedative drugs that reduce the excitability of the nervous system.
Allergy to electromagnetic fields
The first cases of the disease began to be recorded after electrical and electronic devices tightly entered the life of a person. Being in the area of the electromagnetic field, patients complain of poor health, ringing in the ears, headache, nausea.
Some patients have to completely abandon household appliances.
Despite the fact that few people suffer from rare diseases, medicine continues to look for new ways to treat it. In many states, there are special programs that actively study the rarest diseases in the world.