Disease Focus: Skin Conditions

Your skin is the largest organ you have. So, it seems fair to say that skin conditions should never be taken lightly. Now there are plenty of them that are relatively harmless, I'll admit that. But there are tons others that are deadly, and if left untreated can ultimately be fatal. So, in this post I'm going to cover two common skin conditions that are incredibly deadly, but are caused by seemingly mundane things.

The first skin condition I want to discuss is necrotizing fasciitis. It's one of those that you can tell is bad just by the sound of it. Even if that weren't the case, it's also referred to simply as flesh eating bacteria, so that's a pretty good indication that it's a serious condition. As its common name states, necrotizing fasciitis is an infection caused by bacteria that attacks and destroys skin, fat, and muscle tissue at an incredibly fast rate. The bacteria enters the skin most often through a cut, burn, or insect bite. Although it is a rare condition, 25% of cases result in death. So how is it treated? Well that is completely dependent on how early the infection is caught. If detected early enough, treatment can be as simple as standard antibiotics. However if the infection has progressed far enough, amputation may be the only course of action. 

The next condition I want to talk about, rather than being a bacterial infection (like the previous one), it's actually a complication of such infections. Toxic Shock Syndrome, or TSS for short, is a rare condition that can occur suddenly after an infection. It can quickly cause serious harm to major organs, including the lungs, kidneys, and liver. TSS is caused by the same bacteria that causes strep throat and staph infections, which are both fairly common. However on rare occasions these bacteria can enter the blood stream and become very deadly. Treatment includes antibiotics for the bacteria and also specialized treatment for the complications of the various organs. Anyways, the point I want to make is, don't write off something unusual because you think its harmless or you don't want to seem like you're overreacting. Sure, most of the time it probably will be nothing. But on the off chance it's not, early detection could save your life. 

Side note, I would strongly recommend you don't google images of necrotizing fasciitis, like I did for this post, unless you have a very strong stomach.