A team of surgeons was left stunned while conducting a biopsy on a 64-year-old woman from Australia. The woman was admitted to the hospital in 2021 after suffering from multiple symptoms for several weeks, including abdominal pain and diarrhea.
While doctors prescribed her medication upon her release, her symptoms only worsened and started to include respiratory issues, memory loss, and depression.
The woman underwent an MRI, and doctors found what they thought was a tumor. In June 2022, the woman underwent a biopsy. That's when surgeons made a shocking discovery. There was a live parasitic worm in the right frontal lobe of her brain.
"I then picked it up and just went, 'look at it, what is that… It's moving. Let's take it out," Surgeon Hari Priya Bandi said, according to Channel 7 News in Australia.
"There was a moment for me for just feeling a bit nauseated," she added.
The worm was about three inches long. The worm was identified as "Ophidascaris robertsi," a roundworm that is usually found in pythons. It is the first time the parasitic worm has been found in a human. Doctors said the worm made its way through the woman's liver and lungs before settling in her brain.
While the woman did not have contact with any direct contact with the snakes, she lived in an area with a population of carpet pythons and would routinely collect fresh vegetation to eat. Doctors believe she may have inadvertently ingested the worm's eggs while eating the local vegetation.
The doctors said they prescribed the woman medication to clear out any other larvae that may still be inside her body.