Infectious mononucleosis is an acute viral disease. Its main symptoms are a feeling of fatigue, fever, an increase in lymph nodes, spleen and liver. Mononucleosis can be easily treated. However, in some cases, it can lead to neurologic disorders and even to rupture of the spleen.
Causes of infectious mononucleosis
The cause, which leads to the development of this disease, is the Epstein-Barr virus. It belongs to the genus of herpes viruses. It can be infected by contact, both with patients and with healthy people who carry the virus. It is passed at close contact, kisses, through the dishes. Infectious mononucleosis whose symptoms can manifest at any time, exacerbated in the cold period.
Infectious mononucleosis in adults - symptoms
At different stages of the disease has different symptoms. Mononucleosis flows into the infectious incubation period (five to forty-five days) without any symptoms. But as the disease develops, the following signs of infection may appear in a person:
- increase in body temperature (up to 38 degrees);
- weakness of the body, fatigue;
- increase in the size of the tonsils, nasal congestion.
With the rapid development of infection in humans, the temperature rises sharply to the critical level, it shiver, there is increased sweating, it becomes difficult to swallow, the head begins to hurt.
Signs of infectious mononucleosis at the height of the disease
By the sixth day the infection reaches its peak. In this period there are such signs:
- enlarged lymph nodes;
- acute tonsillitis , lesions of mucous throat and nose;
- increase in the size of the spleen and liver;
- fever accompanied by fever, body aches, chills;
- easily removable plaque yellowish shade on the tonsils.
The main symptom for determining mononucleosis is an increase in lymph nodes . Lymphadenopathy is observed in all areas that the doctor is able to test. The most common disease affects the following lymph nodes:
- submaxillary;
- occipital;
- auricle.
Often there may be a rash in infectious mononucleosis, which does not cause anxiety, is not accompanied by itching. She goes through without the use of drugs.
When you feel the lymph nodes they seem compacted, around them can sweaty tissues. With mononucleosis, the size of the lymph nodes can increase to the size of the plum. When pressed on them, the patient does not experience painful sensations.
The most typical symptoms of mononucleosis include an increase in the liver and spleen. Often the patient has jaundice, manifested by such signs:
- deterioration of appetite, nausea;
- darkening of urine;
- the skin becomes yellowish;
- when a blood test shows an increase in bilirubin.
Relapse of infectious mononucleosis occurs only in 10 percent of cases. Approximately two weeks later, the period of recovery, reconvalescence, is coming. The temperature subsides, the headache disappears, the liver and spleen sizes return to normal, later the lymph nodes decrease. The disease can last for a year and a half.
Infectious mononucleosis - diagnosis
The diagnosis is made only after the study of the composition of the blood. In the presence of mononucleosis, moderate leukocytosis is observed, in which the content of monocytes and lymphocytes predominates.
When analyzing blood, you can detect atypical mononuclears - cells with a wide cytoplasm. To diagnose infectious mononucleosis, it is sufficient to increase such cells to 10%, it happens that their number reaches 80%. At the stage of reconvalescence, the composition of the blood comes back to normal, however, atypical mononuclears can remain.
Serological tests determine the presence of antibodies to the VCA antigens of the Epstein-Barr virus. Even at the incubation stage, it is possible to detect serum immunoglobulins M, which at the height of the disease are present in all patients, and two days after recovery disappear.