BrainBlog

Yet another case from the UK: Woman dies of meningitis after swine flu diagnosis • Woman prescribed Tamiflu and paracetamol dies in hospital • Son urges doctors to heed symptoms of other illnesses Karen McVeigh guardian.co.uk Wednesday 12 August 2009 17.02 BST A man whose mother died of meningitis days after being misdiagnosed with swine flu has called on doctors to pay more heed to other illnesses when treating patients. Jasvir Kaur Gill, 48, a mother of three from Leicester, began suffering from a sore throat and vomiting during the evening of Saturday 1 August. She was told to take Tamiflu after a telephone diagnosis, but 12 hours later she suffered a heart attack and was taken to hospital. She died without regaining consciousness, four days later. An inquest, which opened today, heard how her death was caused by meningococcal septicaemia, or blood poisoning caused by meningitis. After the hearing, her son Sukhvinder Gill, 25, said: "We said to the doctors in the hospital, ever...

From The Guardian : Girl, two, dies after swine flu misdiagnosis Child with possible meningitis was 'failed by system' say parents Jo Adetunji guardian.co.uk Saturday 8 August 2009 01.08 BST [snippet] The parents of a two-year-old girl thought to have died from meningitis after they were told she was suffering from swine flu said yesterday that she had been "failed by the system". Georgia Keeling, from Norwich, died after being rushed to hospital on Tuesday. Her parents, Paul Sewell, 21, and Tasha Keeling, 22, said they contacted health services, including NHS Direct, the swine flu helpline and the emergency services, five times after their daughter first developed a temperature on Saturday. The couple said that by Tuesday she had also developed a rash, bruising and had been sick, but their concerns that she might have meningitis were ignored. They said that on two occasions they were told Georgia did not need to be admitted to hospital and after one 999 call, a param...

From The New York Times , accounting of pediatric neurological complications from Texas: Read article [snippet] “The usefulness of this case report is that many doctors who deal with outpatient flu only may never have seen a case with neurological complications,” Dr. Pavia said. “It’s an important reminder that flu can present as seizures or as encephalitis.” [snippet]

John Barry, author of the must-read " The Great Influenza, " recently authored a white paper on H1N1, available here