Patient, usually a child, develops an eruption of successive crops of limpid vesicles, usually accompanying a slight elevation of fever. It is mostly a trivial disorder of childhood. It is accompanied by malaise, headache and backache, and sometimes a prodromal scarlatiniform, morbilliform or urticarial rash. Within twenty four hours, a characteristic rash appears. It is a case of CHICKENPOX or VARICELLA.
The typical vesicles is initially a thin walled, translucent, unilocular, glistening bleb that contains a clear fluid in the most superficial layer of the skin. within two weeks these scabs fall off leaving behind a pigmented scab. pleomorphism is the characteristic of this infection. the temperature rarely exceeds 103 f.
Symptoms
The itchyblisterThe chickenpox rash typically lasts five to ten days and appears 10 to 21 days after virus exposure.
- Fever
- Loss of appetite
- Headache
- Malaise, a state of general malaise and weariness
There are three stages to the chickenpox rash once it appears:
- Papules, raised pink or red bumps that appear over a few days
- Vesicles are tiny blisters filled with fluid that develop within a day or so before rupturing and leaking.
- Blisters that have broken open develop crusts and scabs that take a few more days to heal.
You might be experiencing the bumps, blisters, and scabbed lesions stages of the rash all at once because new bumps keep developing for a few days.
When the condition is severe, lesions can develop in the throat, eyes, mucous membranes of the urethra, anus, and vagina, and the rash can cover the entire body. In healthy children, the disease is typically mild.
Causes
The virus that causes chickenpox infection can be contracted directly from the rash or by inhaling airborne droplets from a person who has the illness.
Complications
Though typically a mild illness, chickenpox can be dangerous and cause a number of complications, such as:
- Skin, soft tissues, bones, joints, or bloodstream infections caused by bacteria (sepsis)
- Dehydration
- Pneumonia
- Encephalitis, a brain inflammation
- Toxic shock syndrome
- Children and teenagers with Reye’s syndrome after taking aspirin during chickenpox
- Death
Risk factor
Those who are more vulnerable to complications from chicken pox include:
- infants and newborns whose mothers never received the vaccine or the chicken pox treatment
- Adolescents and adults
- non-chickenpox-carrying pregnant women
- People who smoke
- individuals whose immune systems have been compromised by a disease or medication (such as chemotherapy) due to cancer, HIV, or another illness
- people who are taking steroids for another illness or condition, like asthma
Chickenpox and pregnancy
When a mother has chickenpox in the week before birth or within a few days of giving birth, her baby has a higher risk of developing a serious, life-threatening infection. Babies born to women who are infected with chickenpox early in their pregnancy are more likely to have low birth weight and limb abnormalities.
Chickenpox and shingles
The varicella-zoster virus stays in your nerve cells after the skin infection heals, and many years later, it can reactivate and resurface as shingles — a painful cluster of short-lived blisters. The virus is more likely to reappear in older adults and people with weakened immune systems. If you had chickenpox, you’re at risk of a complication called shingles.
Postherpetic neuralgia is the term for the shingles pain that can last for a very long time after the blisters have healed.
In order to prevent shingles in adults who have had chickenpox, two vaccines are available: Zostavax and Shingrix. Shingrix is approved and advised for people age 50 and older, including those who have previously received Zostavax. Zostavax is not advised until age 60. Shingrix is preferred over Zostavax.
Prevention
The best way to prevent chickenpox (varicella) is to get vaccinated against it, according to experts from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). When the vaccine doesn’t completely protect against the virus, it still significantly lessens the severity of chickenpox in those cases.
Varivax, the vaccine against chickenpox, is advised for
Young children.Children in the United States receive two doses of the varicella vaccine as part of their routine childhood vaccination schedule, the first between the ages of 12 and 15 months and the second between the ages of 4 and 6.
Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of combining the vaccines with your child’s doctor before administering the vaccine along with the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine to children between the ages of 12 and 23 months.
Unvaccinated older children.Children who have not received the varicella vaccine should receive two catch-up doses, at least three months apart, if they are between the ages of 7 and 12; similarly, children who are between the ages of 13 and 18 who have not received the vaccine should receive two catch-up doses, at least four weeks apart.
Unvaccinated adults who’ve never had chickenpox and are at high risk of exposure.These people include those who work in the medical field, educate children, care for children in daycare facilities, travel abroad, serve in the military, care for children in adult care facilities, and all women who are of childbearing age.
If you don’t remember if you’ve had the vaccine or chickenpox, a blood test can determine your immunity. Adults who have never had chickenpox or been vaccinated typically receive two doses of the vaccine, spaced four to eight weeks apart.
Vaccination against chickenpox is not recommended for:
- Pregnant women
- HIV-positive individuals, as well as those who take immune-suppressing medications, are immune-compromised individuals.
- individuals with gelatin or neomycin allergies
HOMOEOPATHIC TREATMENT
Antimonium tartaricumis best for young children and elderly individuals who are exhausted and have a hydrogenoid constitution. Eruptions are slow to develop, slow to recede, with itching of the skin. Eruptions leave a bluish mark and thick-pox marks. There is also copious, cold, clammy sweat and great faintness.
Pulsatilla nigricanshas a feverish, hot body, the temperature fluctuates, the child is chilly but not thirsty, and the body cannot tolerate cold. It is frequently present in childhood fevers.
Rhus toxicodendronhas a rheumatic constitution and is easily affected by sweat, rain, or getting wet. The onset of fever is with yawning, stretching, and aching in the limbs.
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