Question

An adult patient suffers from low heart rate, low metabolic rate and low body temperature. He also lacks alertness, intelligence and initiative. What can be this disease, its cause and cure?

Answer 1

The disease caused by this person is myxedema. The patient has a puffy appearance and lacks alertness. This disease is caused by the failure of the thyroid gland, a condition resulting from advanced hypothyroidism, or deficiency of thyroxine hormone. These symptoms include the body temperature is usually abnormally low (hypothermia), severe mental changes including hallucinations, disorientation, seizures, and ultimately, deep coma, significant swelling (edema) all over the body with swollen eyes and thickening of the tongue, sparse, dry hair, and loss of the outer thirds of the eyebrows, difficulty breathing, collections of fluid around the lungs and heart, etc. Medical treatment should be given such as intravenous fluids, electrolytes replacement as necessary, thyroid hormones are usually administered through a vein (intravenously or IV) to quickly correct the low thyroid hormone blood level, cortisol, or another adrenal cortical hormone intravenously, and warming blanket if body temperature is low.