News from the Central Dermatology Hospital said that recently, doctors from the hospital’s Women-Children Skin Disease Department treated a patient of Thai ethnicity who was shunned by villagers and called her a child. “forest ghost”.
She is a woman from a poor village in Vo Nhai district, Thai Nguyen province. The patient was hospitalized with blisters and ulcers all over the face, chest, back and limbs.
It is known that when the patient became ill, the patient’s family invited a shaman to treat him. The shaman called the patient a “forest ghost” and requested that he “must make offerings for 7 days and 7 nights and fill the house with offerings to escape”.
Image of the patient on the first day of admission to the hospital. BVCC photo
According to the patient, the shaman asked the patient not to bathe, lie writhing, drink cigarettes, apply light leaves continuously… to expel the “forest ghost” from the body.
But after 3 days of worshiping and applying medicine, the disease did not improve, but the blisters spread and became ulcerated, and no one dared to come close.
Seeing that his mother was in unbearable pain and her illness was getting worse, his son, who was a worker, asked to take his mother to Hanoi for a checkup.
In order to take his mother to the doctor, he had to promise the shaman and his family: “If after 7 days, the hospital cannot cure him, he will take his mother back to the shaman because the shaman said: “If not, the forest ghost will take her away.” .
After examination, doctor Nguyen Minh Huong, Department of Skin Disease Treatment for Women and Children diagnosed the patient with Pemphigus.
To treat patients, the nurses in the patient care team daily carry out medication orders as prescribed by the doctor and, importantly, on-site skin care: bathing, applying medicinal gauze, treating lesions. Cover with Vaseline gauze, moisturize, then bandage.
With the dedicated treatment of the doctor and daily care nurses, the patient can feel secure in coordinating with the doctor, resulting in a quick recovery.
In addition, because the patient’s family is in very difficult circumstances, the doctors have asked the Board of Directors to consider supporting the provision of free meals for patients and caregivers to ensure nutrition, food safety, and help the patient’s family. Patients feel secure in treatment.
Nurses dedicatedly took care of the patient, so the patient’s health and skin inflammation decreased rapidly. BVCC photo
According to Dr. Huong, Pemphigus disease belongs to the group of autoimmune bullous diseases caused by autoantibodies against the interspinous bridge causing acanthosis in the epidermis. It is not an infectious disease. The exact cause has not yet been found. trigger this disease.
Normally, the human body’s immune system will attack foreign invaders such as harmful viruses and bacteria. However, in patients with autoimmune bullous Pemphigus, the body’s immune system produces antibodies that attack healthy cells of the skin and mucous membranes.
Immune cells attack and break the bridges between the cells of the epidermis, forming shallow blisters on the skin.
“The disease is clinically characterized by shallow, fragile blisters that leave behind skin erosions and crusts. Depending on the clinical situation, it may or may not be accompanied by mucosal damage. Principles of whole-body treatment, lifting physical health combined with on-site care.”, Dr. Huong shared.
