Meningitis is an inflammation of the membranes that cover the brain. Many microbes can start such a process: viruses, bacteria, fungi, protozoa. They enter the body in different ways, and they are brought to the shell either by the flow of blood or lymph, or they penetrate from organs close to the brain.
Where does meningitis come from?
Symptoms of purulent meningitis are more likely to occur if:
a) the body is weakened by a serious illness, constant stress, hypothermia, taking cytostatics and glucocorticoid hormones;
b) have diseases of the nervous system:
- in children - cerebral palsy, PEP CNS, various cysts and hemorrhages that appeared in utero;
- in adults - cerebrovascular accident due to atherosclerotic, diabetic changes in blood vessels, damage to their walls due to hypertension;
- in children and adults - hydrocephalus, defects in the bones of the skull, whichoften accompanied by CSF leakage through the nose or ear;
c) a rather aggressive microbe entered the body, which was able to overcome the protection of the brain and its membranes, or the bacterium was introduced through the broken integrity of the bones of the skull during its injuries, pathological fistulas (messages).
The more risk factors, the more likely it is that the disease will develop if a bacterium enters the body.
Symptoms of purulent meningitis can appear after contact with a sick person with meningococcal (less often pneumococcal or hemophilic) infection. The disease also develops as a complication against the background of tolerated purulent diseases:
- pneumonia;
- otitis media, rhinitis, sinusitis, frontal sinusitis or ethmoiditis;
- osteomyelitis of the bones of the skull;
- sepsis;
- boil or carbuncle located on the face, head, neck;
- purulent endophthalmitis and some other diseases.
Purulent meningitis: symptoms
1. Intolerable headache, which appeared on the background of high body temperature. With such sensations, it is impossible to work, sit at a computer, play games, watch TV: you want silence, peace. It is easier to lie down than to sit or stand. Children who can't speak yet cry because of this pain, but they don't really want to go into their arms, because in this position they get worse.
Pain is bad and briefly relieved by painkillers. The more the disease progresses, the worsethese types of drugs work unless antibiotic treatment is started.
2. Body temperature, which usually reaches very high numbers.
3. Nausea.
4. Vomiting, after which it does not get better. No diarrhea, no connection with expired food either.
5. Photophobia.
6. Convulsions, often repeated, when a person not only involuntarily bends or unbends the limbs or stretches the whole body, but also has no reaction to others, breathing may stop.
7. A rash that does not go away when the skin is stretched. It usually begins with the buttocks, then the distant parts of the limbs, then goes to the shoulders and hips, torso. It happens on the face, but rarely. Black patches may form around the rash where the skin has died.
As for the rash, I would like to say the following: if it occurs against the background of high body temperature, even if the person does not complain about anything else, urgently call an ambulance. In this case, a lightning-fast (in hours and minutes) development of the disease is possible, and even meningitis may not have time to develop, and the person will die from a hemorrhage in the adrenal glands.
8. Impaired consciousness: delirium, agitation or, conversely, drowsiness, it is difficult to wake a person up - symptoms of purulent meningitis.
9. Of the objective signs, you can only check the ability to reach the chin to the sternum in the prone position: if there is meningitis, then there is a distance between them, and when checking this symptom, the neck and back often "pull"
In what cases is purulent meningitis of the brain contagious?
When it is caused by bacteria such as meningococcus, Haemophilus influenzae, rarely pneumococcus. Only these microbes (especially meningococcus) can be transmitted from one person to another by airborne droplets. Can infect another:
- patient with runny nose and sore throat caused by meningococcus;
- carrier of this bacterium;
- a person who developed a rash due to this condition;
- a patient with meningococcal, pneumococcal or hemophilic meningitis.
At the same time, contagiousness persists only until antibiotics are taken in sufficient doses: as soon as a person has been properly treated, he ceases to pose a danger to others, even if the symptoms of purulent meningitis have not yet disappeared.
Therefore, if one family member was hospitalized with suspected meningococcal infection or meningitis caused by one of these three bacteria, the rest of the family should have a nasopharyngeal culture for meningococcal carriage, and also take Spiramycin prophylactically, or at least would be the remedy "Ciprofloxacin".
So, if it seems to you that you see symptoms of purulent meningitis in yourself or a close relative, do not wait, call an ambulance team that will take the patient to the infectious diseases hospital. In this case, overdiagnosis is better than none.
