Scrub typhus usually announces itself with fever, rash, swollen lymph nodes and often a dark scab at the site of a chigger bite. In one patient treated in southern India, the infection showed up in a far less expected way: tetany, the involuntary muscle contractions and spasms that can occur when certain blood minerals drop too low.
Pediatricians at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) Bibinagar, in Telangana, described the case in Tropical Doctor. The report, published online in July and included in the journal's October issue, ties the spasms to symptomatic hypocalcemia and hypophosphatemia, meaning abnormally low levels of calcium and phosphate in the blood.
