kangaSue
Senior Member
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- Brisbane, Australia
Just come across a number of papers making the case that reactivation of varicella-zoster virus (VZV) can be the cause of abdominal pain in several gastrointestinal conditions including IBS and gastroparesis.
VZV lays dormant in everyone who has had childhood chicken pox but even those having been vaccinated for this can be subject to issues of reactivation down the track.
In the phase of reactivation, VZV can affect only the enteric neurons (enteric zoster) without any outwards sign of a skin rash. The manifestations of enteric zoster have yet to be identified but, because reactivation is lethal to the neurons in which it occurs, these manifestations may include multiple intestinal disorders of unknown pathogenesis, such as irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory bowel disease, idiopathic gastroparesis, and chronic intestinal idiopathic pseudo-obstruction.
Some research is finding that while some test protocols find no sign of ZVZ, the appearance of VZV DNA in the saliva of patients with abdominal pain is looking to be suggestive of enteric zoster. The examination of saliva in the context of abdominal pain for which no cause has been found after a gastroenterological workup therefore provides a non-invasive diagnostic test for enteric zoster.
I've just skimmed it so far but it looks like the abdominal pain can be eliminated with the antiviral med valaciclovir (Valcivir), still looking to see if that then helps with the other symptoms of GI dysfunction too.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5005185/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25882301/
http://pubmedcentralcanada.ca/pmcc/articles/PMC3324263/
VZV lays dormant in everyone who has had childhood chicken pox but even those having been vaccinated for this can be subject to issues of reactivation down the track.
In the phase of reactivation, VZV can affect only the enteric neurons (enteric zoster) without any outwards sign of a skin rash. The manifestations of enteric zoster have yet to be identified but, because reactivation is lethal to the neurons in which it occurs, these manifestations may include multiple intestinal disorders of unknown pathogenesis, such as irritable bowel syndrome, inflammatory bowel disease, idiopathic gastroparesis, and chronic intestinal idiopathic pseudo-obstruction.
Some research is finding that while some test protocols find no sign of ZVZ, the appearance of VZV DNA in the saliva of patients with abdominal pain is looking to be suggestive of enteric zoster. The examination of saliva in the context of abdominal pain for which no cause has been found after a gastroenterological workup therefore provides a non-invasive diagnostic test for enteric zoster.
I've just skimmed it so far but it looks like the abdominal pain can be eliminated with the antiviral med valaciclovir (Valcivir), still looking to see if that then helps with the other symptoms of GI dysfunction too.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5005185/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25882301/
http://pubmedcentralcanada.ca/pmcc/articles/PMC3324263/