This Week in Parasitism26 Sep 2025

TWiP 265: Things that jump are cleaner than things that squat

TWiP solves the case about the parasite check in summer camp, and presents a new case about a woman who traveled to Brazil and developed furuncles on the back of her head.

Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Daniel Griffin, and Christina Naula

Subscribe (free): Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, RSS, email

Links for this episode

Join the MicrobeTV Discord server
Hero: Francesco Redi
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francesco_Redi
- Linda Hall Library, Kansas: https://www.lindahall.org/about/news/scientist-of-the-day/francesco-redi/
- Habermehl, G., (1994). Francesco Redi—Life and work, Toxicon 32 (4) https://doi.org/10.1016/0041-0101(94)90292-5.
Letters read on TWiP 265

New Case

From Eyal Leshem, a returning case "provider"

43 years old female who travelled to Brazil on May 2025 for a two week dance class. The dance school is located in a farm two hour drive West of Rio de Janeiro.

Upon return to Israel she started feeling pricking and "movements" and under her scalp on the back of her head. She noted three non-healing furuncles on the back of her head A month after she returned movement and pricking in the back of her scalp increased, the furuncles enlarged and produced serous discharge. Several days before her ED visit she thinks an "object" dropped from the back of her scalp, but being outdoors, she could not locate the object.

On physical examination she is afebrile and her vitals are normal, and on the back of her head two indurated were detected under the hair on the back of her head. Serous discharge was produced by pushing the furuncles. A non-surgical office procedure led to immediate recovery and confirmed the diagnosis.

What was the parasite? What was the procedure?

Become a patron of TWiP

Send your questions and comments to twip@microbe.tv

Music by Ronald Jenkees

Det här avsnittet är hämtat från ett öppet RSS-flöde och publiceras inte av Podme. Det kan innehålla reklam.

Avsnitt(285)

TWiP 285: Why Is Cyclospora So Hard to Contain? Parasitologists Explain the 2026 US Outbreak

TWiP reviews our current understanding of the biology of Cyclospora, the parasite currently causing a large multistate outbreak in the US traced to contaminated lettuce, and why it is so difficult to ...

6 Aug 52min

TWiP 284: It's not the pork

TWiP solves the case of the 39-year-old man originally from Guatemala, who moved to one of the NYC boroughs in 2023 and presented with headaches for nearly 1 year. Hosts: Vincent Racaniello, Daniel Gr...

27 Juli 50min

TWiP 283: Warming up to cryptosporidiosis

TWiP reviews the projected impact of climate change on the burden of Cryptosporidium in Mali, Kenya, and The Gambia. Hosts: Vincent Racaniello and Christina Naula Subscribe (free): Apple Podcasts, Goo...

7 Juli 1h

TWiP 282: Does he live in New York?

TWiP solves the case of the nonbinary patient in his 30s with a history HIV/AIDS presenting with 3 weeks of subjective fevers, chills, generalized weakness and voluminous ostomy output. Hosts: Vincent...

24 Juni 53min

TWiP 281: Ants under the influence

TWiP reviews gene expression in wood ants infected with the larval lancet fluke, which causes them to leave their nest and attach to a flower until they are eaten by a grazing mammal. Hosts: Vincent R...

22 Juni 58min

TWiP 280: The wriggling diagnosis

TWiP solves the case of the 3 yo child, who recently immigrated to the US from Central America, in the ER with acute right lower quadrant abdominal pain and a rather active serpiginous wormlike 'thing...

29 Maj 57min

TWiP 279: Tolling for hookworms

TWiP reviews a phase 2 clinical trial of a recombinant vaccine against N. americanus glutathione S-transferase-1, an enzyme that performs a crucial enzymatic step in hookworm blood feeding. Hosts: Vin...

1 Maj 50min

TWiP 278: Trichinella from eating bear eyeballs

TWiP solves the case of the male in his 20s from Hokkaido, Japan, who developed fatigue and rash, followed by fever and myalgia 6 days later, after eating a raw bear eyeball. Hosts: Vincent Racaniello...

24 Apr 56min