Case of the sudden paralysis

I decided not to put the actual diagnosis on the blog as I thought it would be fun to see if anyone could guess it!

This is a real case which happened to me fairly soon after qualifying

A lady in her fourties came in to hospital with tingling sensations in her toes.  She was laughing about not having painted her toenails when the Dr examined her.

Shortly afterwards, she went off the ward with a friend of hers and it was clear that the tingling she had reported in her toes was spreading.  She was walking like a zombie, gripping the walls for support and her legs were becoming jelly before our eyes. Still, she insisted she was going for a walk! I'm not too sure how far she got before her friend brought her back in a wheelchair!



The dr decided that this was the onset of M.S. since her brother had also been diagnosed with this some years earlier and she was at the right age for it to be presenting.  Fortunately however, the senior dr disagreed!

No more than two hours later, the patient pressed her buzzer and I found her sitting up in bed, hardly able to hold herself up and she was coughing.  When I asked her what was wrong, she told me that she was experiencing trouble breathing.  Commencing oxygen therapy was the first obvious treatment and the drs were summoned immediately.  By now, the patient realised that something serious was going on.

On taking her to the high dependency unit, some of the nurses were looking at the escort of three Dr's, myself and two porters like we were idiots. 

(Usually people attending HDU are unconscious, not sitting up in bed holding an oxygen mask to their face- she was doing this however because lying down made it too difficult for her to breathe)  One of them remarked, " that lady isn't poorly enough to be here!" Thank goodness they were not a Dr!  On speaking to the registrar who rightly diagnosed her, this lady was artificially ventilated for six weeks before beginning a slow and lengthy recovery.

Considering only 1500 people are diagnosed with this each year, (that's another clue) it was lucky this lady had good Dr's seeing to her (as well as an amazing nurse! By the way - that wasn't me, I was still supernumery at the time!)

I'm sure the A10 crew will have no doubt guessing this diagnosis!  See if anyone can crack it!