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A man with an incurable itch in his foot finally discovered that what he assumed was a varicose vein actually turned out to be a huge worm.
The unidentified 42-year-old came to see doctors at Peking Union Medical College, in Beijing, where he asked about a mark on his foot that resembled a varicose vein.
As The Daily Mail reports, the rash had started showing up about one month earlier, after he returned home from a trip to Nigeria.
Once doctors finally examined the raised wavy rash, they had some unsettling new for the man: the “varicose vein” on his foot was actually a parasite.
As explained in the New England Journal of Medicine, the man was diagnosed with cutanteous larva migrans, a parasitic skin infection caused by hookworm larvae.
These hookworms are generally in the intestines of house pets, but they shed their eggs through feces, which is likely how this particular patient’s infection started.
Most doctors recommend wearing shoes when walking outside to prevent developing a parasitic skin infection like this one.
Because these parasites thrive in sandy places, it’s important not to walk through beachy areas barefoot.
In this particular case, the man was given an anti-parasitic drug called albendazole and after a couple of weeks, the marks on his foot finally vanished.
