Shingles Facts
Shingles Facts That You Need to Know
If you keep track of these shingles facts, you will know if that's what you or your loved one is suffering from, and how to treat it.
• Roughly one in five hundred people in the United States suffer from shingles. Facts say that is a total of about 500,000 Americans. In your lifetime, you run a 20% risk of developing shingles.
• Shingles is an infection that is viral, and it happens years after you had chicken pox. It is believed that if you contract shingles, it is due to your lowered immunity to the viral infection that causes chicken pox, after your body fought with chicken pox some period of years ago.
• Shingles facts confirm that the disease causes severe pain in the nerves that are within the area affected. Generally, older people are more likely to suffer from shingles, but you can contract it at any age. It especially attacks people whose immune system is compromised.
• Shingles is itchy and painful, but not generally dangerous unless your immune system is compromised. It can even be fatal in some cases, if you have compromised immunity. It is caused by a reinfection of chicken pox that you probably had decades earlier. Shingles facts confirm that people who are infected with shingles are contagious, but if they infect someone, it would be with the original viral disease, chicken pox, rather than with shingles.
• Treatment for shingles can include antiviral drugs, antidepressants, steroids, and topical agents and analgesics for pain relief. The antiviral will generally stop the progression of the rash, and prevent complications. You can also use a topical antiviral to help, as long as it is introduced early in the disease's progression.
• Treating the pain and itch of shingles, facts say, is mainly done with products like calamine lotion, along with aspirin, which can be combined with codeine, if there is severe pain. Corticosteroids and anti-depressants help you to deal with the pain that still exists when the infection has been treated.
• The severity of a shingles attack can be minimized if you seek treatment as soon as you can. The longer you put treatment off, perhaps believing you can clear it up with lotions, etc., the longer it will take you to recover.
• Currently there is an American study ongoing about how to prevent shingles. The study is evaluating the effectiveness of a vaccine for shingles. Facts include ongoing research into a shingles vaccine, and at last report, they were still recruiting new patients for the study. It is believed that the chicken pox vaccine may be effective against shingles, when administered closer to the age that a person normally might contract shingles.
• Other than placing hope in an eventual vaccine, the best thing for you to do if you contract shingles is to seek medical help as soon as possible, to make the episode as short in duration as possible.