Saifullah Sani
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After scientists uncover case of Briton whose brain was home to moving tapeworm for four years, former teacher tells how he too was diagnosed with a tapeworm in the brain
About seventeen years ago I started feeling odder than usual, with an antipathy to windows, mirrors and glass in general.
I also felt claustrophobic in cars and experienced dizziness and mental absences. I thought I was going mad.
Doctors and hospitals thought they were mini-strokes, transient ischaemic attacks.
One evening, sitting at home in north London, for the first time in my life I had an epileptic fit, followed by four more.
I was taken by ambulance to the local hospital and then, after days of tests, to the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in Queens Square where scans indicated cancer: a fast-growing tumour of the brain.
I felt doomed. Adding to the distress was a sense that I had achieved far too little in life and I resolved to make some kind of new start if I came through this.
My three-hour brain operation revealed something initially puzzling, which eventually, to my amazement and relief, and that of my family and the doctors, turned out to be a dead tropical tapeworm.
This struck everyone as utterly remarkable - especially as I have never visited the tropics. That mystery remains.
The doctors told me that the illness is commonplace in the developing world and easily treated by a ten-day course of antibiotics.
The name of the condition is cysticercosis but the doctor who conveyed the diagnosis to me, probably unfamiliar with the illness, called it cystipsychosis.
Having spent years researching medical terminology, I felt obliged to correct him as his word implied that I imagined myself to be some sort of handbag.
Since then I have felt perfectly healthy. The whole experience put me on a new track and turned me into Racker Donnelly, a comic poetic entertainer. Whether that turns out to be a good or bad thing, only time will tell.
How I lived with a tapeworm in my brain - Telegraph
About seventeen years ago I started feeling odder than usual, with an antipathy to windows, mirrors and glass in general.
I also felt claustrophobic in cars and experienced dizziness and mental absences. I thought I was going mad.
Doctors and hospitals thought they were mini-strokes, transient ischaemic attacks.
One evening, sitting at home in north London, for the first time in my life I had an epileptic fit, followed by four more.
I was taken by ambulance to the local hospital and then, after days of tests, to the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery in Queens Square where scans indicated cancer: a fast-growing tumour of the brain.
I felt doomed. Adding to the distress was a sense that I had achieved far too little in life and I resolved to make some kind of new start if I came through this.
My three-hour brain operation revealed something initially puzzling, which eventually, to my amazement and relief, and that of my family and the doctors, turned out to be a dead tropical tapeworm.
This struck everyone as utterly remarkable - especially as I have never visited the tropics. That mystery remains.
The doctors told me that the illness is commonplace in the developing world and easily treated by a ten-day course of antibiotics.
The name of the condition is cysticercosis but the doctor who conveyed the diagnosis to me, probably unfamiliar with the illness, called it cystipsychosis.
Having spent years researching medical terminology, I felt obliged to correct him as his word implied that I imagined myself to be some sort of handbag.
Since then I have felt perfectly healthy. The whole experience put me on a new track and turned me into Racker Donnelly, a comic poetic entertainer. Whether that turns out to be a good or bad thing, only time will tell.
How I lived with a tapeworm in my brain - Telegraph
