Symptoms and types of shingles you may experience

Shingles can occur at any age, but the elderly are at higher risk, with symptoms often more severe and persistent. The characteristic symptom of shingles is the appearance of red patches, blisters growing on one side of the body.

Introduction to shingles

Shingles is a reactivation of the varicella-zoster virus (VZV) that has long been hiding in the body of an infected person. The first person with varicella-zoster will get chickenpox. Even after the chickenpox has healed, the virus remains in the nerve cells in an inactivated form. When viruses reactivate, they move from nerve cells to the skin, causing patches of blisters.

Symptoms of shingles

Symptoms and types of shingles you may experience • SignsSymptomsList.com

The earliest signs that you have shingles include headache, fever, and flu-like fatigue. These symptoms are not specific, so they can be misdiagnosed with other diseases.

Immediately after, the patient's body will feel burning, itchy, sensitive to the touch. The pain will be moderate to severe in the area of ​​the body where the rash occurs, with sensations often described as stinging, itching, pain, or discomfort.

Shingles in children is usually painless, with age the symptoms worsen. The onset of the disease usually lasts 1-2 days and can last up to 3 weeks. This is followed by an advanced stage with thicker red patches appearing on the skin. A painful erythematous rash usually occurs on the hips, back, and rarely on the face, eyes, or other parts of the body.

The rash starts out as urticaria, but if the urticaria can spread to the whole body, shingles will only cause changes in the skin that is limited to one side of the body, not the other side.

The erythema then becomes succulent, with small, exudative vesicles. Patient still has fever and malaise. The blisters become darker as they fill with blood and pull on the brow (scabs) within 7-10 days. Usually, the brow will fall off on its own and the skin will heal, but in cases where the rash is extensive and has many blisters, it can leave scars or make the skin lighter.

Other types of shingles

Zona in eyes, face

Symptoms and types of shingles you may experience • SignsSymptomsList.com

The skin on the forehead, on the eyelids, and around the eyes may appear erythematous and bullous. Shingles in the eye occurs in 10% to 25% of cases of shingles. In some people, symptoms can include conjunctivitis, keratitis, uveitis, vision loss, and myasthenia gravis.

Zona ear (also known as Ramsay Hunt's type II)

Symptoms and types of shingles you may experience • SignsSymptomsList.com

The disease usually causes the following symptoms: ear pain, blisters in the ear, facial paralysis, possibly with poor appetite, blisters, ulcers in the mouth, lymph nodes in front and behind the ears.

Zona mouth

Symptoms and types of shingles you may experience • SignsSymptomsList.com

Shingles can occur in the mouth. Blisters may appear on the nasopharynx. Initially, oral shingles have the appearance of blisters 1-4mm in size. They break very quickly and leave sores that make the patient uncomfortable in daily activities of eating, drinking, and talking. The sore will heal on its own in about 10-14 days.

Episodes of pain in the mouth can be mistaken for a toothache. Sometimes this pain prompts you to go to the dentist.

Risk factors for shingles

Statistics show that about one-third of the population will get shingles in their lifetime. The annual number of new cases ranges from 1-4/1,000 healthy people and from 4-12/1,000 people older than 65 years. About 50% of people over the age of 85 will have one shingles episode and 5% will have two or more.

Risk factors for reactivation of the virus include:

- Old age

- Immunodeficiency


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