Morgellons: Medical Mystery Revisited

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Morgellons: Medical Mystery Revisited Last Edited: Tuesday, 13 Feb 2007, 9:13 PM CST Created: Tuesday, 13 Feb 2007, 8:36 PM CST MyFOX9.comSideBarRelated ItemsVideosStories Medical Mystery: MorgellonsThere's nothing out of the ordinary when you first meet the Houchins family. But then, ordinary really is only skin deep. http://www.myfoxtwincities.com/myfox/pages/Home/Detail;jsessionid=86167F40A1FE7DB6F5ECB138EB6F5CD4?contentId=2373104 & version=2 & locale=EN-US & layoutCode=TSTY & pageId=1.1.1Roy Houchins started noticing changes in his body about 3 years ago... "You try to sleep at night, you can't sleep,” he said. “The inside of your ears, your eyes, there's biting and stinging as well. You look for things and you can't find anything." He dropped 40 pounds in just two months. He stopped sleeping, his vision began to blur and even more bizarre, he says he felt bugs crawling under his skin. "I actually had a piece of a bug that came out of my foot,” he said. At first, Houchins and his wife thought it might be lice, until he rubbed some salts across his skin and, as he says, “this black thing probably about 2mm long came out unfurled onto my…and I just looked at it and said I've never seen anything like this before.I felt like a single parent with a very sick spouse who I couldn't help and he couldn't explain to me what was going on, what he was felling,” Houchins’ wife, Christine, said. In a panic, and wondering if he was crazy, Houchins turned to the internet,a dn found the answer to his symptoms. It’s a syndrome some are calling Morgellons -- named after a similar skin disease from the 17th century. Houchins is among more than 3,000 others from coast to coast claiming to have the same symptoms. He says there are 30 here in Minnesota. We met Linda Vosylius on one of her "good" days. The former nurse has a tough time peeling herself off the couch. Her mind is fuzzy, and bandages hide deep lesions on her face... "It's a life of terror,” she said. “And a life that at some point will be worth living again, or not." Vosylious says she's had Morgellons for 20 years. She no longer works, and her husband bathes her. She has coughing spells, shooting pains in her muscles and joints, and there are these strange string-like fibers. "In the back of my throat, I think this is one of their party spots,” she said. "I know they're there because I took a piece of gauze wound around a finger and did a scrape back there.” Maybe even more bizarre than the symptoms of Morgellons is what doctors are saying. Dr. Jennifer Biglow is a dermatologist in the Twin Cities. She says the lesions, bug-like sensations and the fibers are alarming, but not because of their physical traits, but because they are also part of delusions of parasitosis. Dr. Biglow says dermatologists have known of the condition, delusions of parasitosis, or DOP for many years. Simply put, years of research prove these symptoms are delusions and are not really happening. "If you relax a minute and you think about the sensation of something crawling underneath your skin you will feel it,” she said. Most doctors and medical professionals agree with the DOP diagnosis, yet there is a small handful who say this is too strange to ignore. Dr. Randy Wymore is a medical researcher with Oklahoma State University. He began collecting these fibers from people in four different states and started running tests. He says the fibers don't match up. "Humans don't grow red and blue fibers,” he said. “I mean that's kind of what it all boils down to, but the fibers are still there." Dan Rutz, a spokesman for the CDC in Atlanta says they have formed a task force to investigate the symptoms of Morgellons. At this point, experts say there's not enough evidence to present a public threat, or concern, or even verify these symptoms are real. "We want to let people know we're going about this open mindedly and sincerely with a true intent to come to some reasonable conclusions on it,” Rutz said. Dr. Biglow has concerns too, and says giving these symptoms a name, like Morgellons, may give some patients a false sense of reality. "There is one category of patients that may miss adequate treatment because they're using the internet and website as a place of security,” she said. "These individuals are suffering -- they're suffering and they're uncomfortable and they're afraid and they're anxious and you need to take care of these patients with an open mind." Houchins and Vosylious say that's all they ask -- that someone take them seriously. Both Roy and Linda say they've found doctors locally to treat some of their symptoms, but not for Morgellons. Instead, they're taking medication for insomnia, and other drugs and treatments for symptoms linked to lyme disease, and multiple sclerosis. For more information: www.morgellons.org