DENVER (Ivanhoe Broadcast News) -- Just
choosing which shirt to wear makes a difference for Carl Bozeman.
"I used to lean forward at work a lot just so I could get my shirt
to pull away from my skin," he says. "You begin to think this is
never going to go away, and so you just kind of live with that
pain."
Bozeman has shingles, a virus that causes blisters on the skin. It's actually a remnant of childhood chicken pox.
"Most people who have had chicken pox are walking around and they have virus in their body, and at some point later in life it can actually reactivate," Dianna Quan, M.D., a neurologist at University of Colorado Health Sciences Center in Denver, tells Ivanhoe.
Bozeman says, "It's probably the worst pain I ever felt. It had me so worried, I checked myself in. Turned out that it was not a heart attack. It was the shingles."
Shingles most common in people older
than 50, but anyone who's ever had chicken pox is at risk -- 20
percent of the population will develop shingles at some time in
their life. And there is no cure. But at the University of Colorado
Health Sciences Center, new research provides hope.
Doctors first gave shingles patients the mouth sore medication Zovirax intravenously for two weeks. Then patients took the herpes medication, Valtrex, orally for a month.
"What we found was about half the
patients actually got better," Dr. Quan says. Other treatments for
pain associated with shingles include steroids, antidepressants and
topical agents. But these drugs only provide limited effects. The
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends anyone older
than 50 get a shingles vaccine.
Bozeman is now drug and pain free, wears whatever he wants, and thinks everyone should get a shingles vaccine. "It's something you do not want to get," he says.
This article was reported by Ivanhoe.com, which offers Medical Alerts by e-mail every day of the week. To subscribe, click on: http://www.ivanhoe.com/newsalert/.
If you would like more information, please contact:
Office of Dianna Quan, M.D.
University of Colorado Health Sciences Center
Denver, CO
(303) 315-7221
