Meningoencephalitis diagnosis

[beba51]

My 26 year old daughter was taken to a hospital in New Orleans on July 13 by ambulance. She suddenly had lost the feeling in her leg and had to drag herself to get to the phone. She was dizzy, blured vision, nausia, headache. When she arrived at the hospital she moved to a wheelchair and triaged she was  told to wait in the ER waiting room Most of the symptoms had gone away, except for the headache and nausia. She waited in the er waiting room for 2 hours. A friend was with her and said she was laying on 2 chairs because she felt to ill to sit up. No medical staff ever cheched on her while she waited. After 2 hours she fell unconcious and had a seizure she was still in the waiting room when this occured. She died the next day after surgery. I was told she had a ruptured aneurysm. A autopsy was preformed and the diagnosis is Viral Meningoencephalitis. No aneurysm was found.Can you tell me if immediate treatment of this could have made a difference. My daughter was in Haiti,three weeks before this happened. She was also doing her thesis work on waste water treatment and was sampling treatment ponds in New Orleans. The ER people were not aware of this because her treatment started after she went unconcious. Please explain to me what this  illness is and could immediate treatment have helped. Thank you......

[CCF-Neuro-M.D.-JT]

I am deeply sorry to hear about your daughter. Viral meninogencephalitis is a serious infection of the brain tissue and the protective layers surrounding it called meninges. Although patients whose immune system are compromised due to a number of reasons are more prone to this, normal people unfortunately get this too. It can start out like the flu that quickly progresses to an all out infection of the brain, manifesting as seizures, headache,and decreased level of consciousness. FOr most cases, there are no specific treatments available such as the antibiotics we use for bacterial infections. However, for some viruses such as the herpes virus, you can use acyclovir to treat it.
I would be very concerned about the water she was testing as there are mosquitos that can spread viral infections as well as several bacterial infections you can pick up in contaminated water. Also, the trip to Haiti is quite significant as she would have been exposed to a whole other range of infectious pathogens there. Talk to an infectious disease physician about your daughter's case as well as getting the actual path report. If the actual infection was due to bacterial rather than viral causes, then time would certainly have played a big role in her outcome.Again, I am truly sorry about your loss. I wish you all the best.

[beba51]

Thank you for your response. I spoke with a ER DR. in La. yesterday who has been working with the encephalitis cases in La. all summer. He said because she did not have the symptoms that are usually associated with this illness, fever, vomiting diareha etc. That he did not believe it was encephalits. I am confused. The coroners office has been running test for almost 2months. Does this have to be reported to the CDC? Should I get them involved? Please give me as much information as you can on this. Is menigeo a rare strain? My daughter was seen by several people only hours before she became ill and her only complaint was that she was tired. Other then that she seemed fine to these people. Can you shed some more light on this for me. Thank you

[WendyS]

Beba... perhaps you will visit Encephalitis Global http://communities.msn.com/EncephalitisGlobal  to speak to people touched by encephalitis