Rare disease makes girl unable to feel pain

[QueenBee]

I wasn't sure wether to put it here or in the General Forum, but I figured this leans to the Science-way...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6379795/

I picked some of the (in my opinion) most interesting bits, since the article is very long.

Ashlyn is among a tiny number of people in the world known to have congenital insensitivity to pain with anhidrosis, or CIPA — a rare genetic disorder that makes her unable to feel pain.

The untreatable disease also makes Ashlyn incapable of sensing extreme temperatures — hot or cold — disabling her body’s ability to cool itself by sweating. Otherwise, her senses are normal.

Ashlyn’s baby teeth posed big problems. She would chew her lips bloody in her sleep, bite through her tongue while eating, and once even stuck a finger in her mouth and stripped flesh from it.

Family photos reveal a series of these self-inflicted injuries. One picture shows Ashlyn in her Christmas dress, hair neatly coifed, with a swollen lip, missing teeth, puffy eye and athletic tape wrapped around her hands to protect them. She smiles like a little boxer who won a prize bout.

Her first serious injury came at age 3, when she laid her hand on a hot pressure washer in the back yard. Ashlyn’s mother found her staring at her red, blistered palm.

“It’s a lot to take in. It opens your eyes to things you wouldn’t normally think about,” says Tara Blocker. “If she sees blood, she knows to stop. There’s only so much you can tell a 5-year-old.”

There was a documentary here about that a long long time ago, I don't think it was the same girl though. It was also a little girl, and for example when she would crawl outside, she would crawl on the cement on her backyard and her knees would start bleeding and she wouldn't feel a thing. Isn't that awful?

I mean, it does sound like something cool, when you first think about it. I know I would be the worst troublemaker at school. People could try to hurt me but.. MUAHAHA! ....

People who have the disease probably learn what's harmful and what isn't, but just imagine that you could be hurting yourself at any minute without noticing! For example, let's say someone just boiled soup on the stove and you are standing with your back against the hot plate, and you accidently put your hand on it without even noticing! You could get serious burns without having a clue!

And you would have to constantly be checking your body and what's going on around you, to be sure something bad isn't happening to you. Awful.

[teeny]

yeah it must be awful but then again.. as time will pass by people can learn what to avoid. Just the same way kids learn to stay away from fire by burning their finger or similar. They only inflict the same damage a few times to know it shouldn't be done.
So I guess that people with such a disease would be able to learn what not to do aswell. But only after people either tell them or they see the end result presented to them.

[forre]

I saw a person who was unable to feel the temperature of the environment. So the guy learned to check the thermometer before going outside and dress accordingly. He was living a pretty normal life.

Thanks for the article, QueenBee, it's interesting.

[freddie]

This is odd. Pain is nothing but a normal sensation pushed to it's limits, up to the point where it becomes unbarable, right? So a person with such a disease couldn't even feel ANYTHING, not even a touch of the hand, so that person would have to be completely senseless, since pain is nothing more then a sense.
Let me draw an analogy here: it's the same as saying that somebody doesn't hear strickly the sounds that become painfully loud, while they can hear perfectly well at normal decibel levels. That doesn't make much sense does it? If you hear the quiet sounds then you SHOULD hear painfuly loud ones as well. Even more so. Much more intensely. Same with senses: if you can sense normal things, then you should be sensing pain, (which is just one of the senses at it's most intense), that much more.

[QueenBee]

freddie, I thought so too. The documentary that was shown here a long time ago portrayed a girl as unable to feel anything. She could only feel things very "numb", like when her mother hugged her. But the article says:

Ashlyn can feel the texture of nickels and dimes she sorts into piles on her bedroom floor, the heft of the pink backpack she totes to school and the embrace of a hug. She feels hunger cravings for her favorite after-school snack, pickles and strawberry milk.

That’s because the genetic mutation that causes CIPA only disrupts the development of the small nerve fibers that carry sensations of pain, heat and cold to the brain.

“There are all kinds of different nerve cells that help us feel different sensations,” says Dr. Felicia Axelrod, a professor of pediatrics and neurology at New York University School of Medicine. “You can have one sense removed, just like you can lose your hearing but still smell things.”

[haku]

Originally Posted by freddie

This is odd. Pain is nothing but a normal sensation pushed to it's limits

No, the sense of touch and pain is not the same thing (you can have pain in a part of your body which doesn't have the sense of touch).

People with this desease have the sense of touch, if they hold an object, they can sense that object, but if that object is harming them, they don't feel any pain.
So if they put their hand on a hot plate, they sense the plate, but they don't feel the heat, and they don't feel that it's buring them.

I remember seeing a documentary on that desease, and people who suffer from it have to be extremely careful about everything, even to simply put their clothes on. When you have a piece of clothing which is not well positioned and rub your skin in a wrong way, you feel it and correct it, those people don't. I remember that woman explaining that she had to be very careful when she put her clothes on, especially her underwear, that everything was perfectly set because she could end up with a bad cut from a piece of clothing rubbing her skin all day long without her noticing it until she saw blood.

[kishkash]

Originally Posted by freddie

So a person with such a disease couldn't even feel ANYTHING, not even a touch of the hand, so that person would have to be completely senseless, since pain is nothing more then a sense.

I don't even wanna think of the rammafications that could have LATER in life...if ya know what i mean.....

......ya know what i mean right.....





poor little girl

[PowerPuff Grrl]

Originally Posted by kishkash

I don't even wanna think of the rammafications that could have LATER in life...if ya know what i mean.....

......ya know what i mean right.....





poor little girl

Riiiiiiiiiiiiiiiight, I hear you loud and clear ...

You're talking about sex right?

Hmmm, but when you think about it you cannot miss what you do not know.
And on a brighter note, if she ever chooses to have children, she can deliver while reading a book or something.