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Trench fever episodes may involve loss of appetite, shin pain or tenderness, and spleen enlargement. Generally, one to five periodic episodes of fever occur, separated by four-to-six-day-long asymptomatic periods. [10] Recovery takes a month or more. Lethal cases are rare, but in a few cases "the persistent fever might lead to heart failure".
The predominant disease in the trenches of the Western Front was trench fever. Trench fever was a common disease spread through the faeces of body lice, which were rampant in trenches. Trench fever caused headaches, shin pain, splenomegaly, rashes and relapsing fevers – resulting in lethargy for months. [55]
Bartonella quintana, originally known as Rochalimaea quintana, [2] and "Rickettsia quintana", [3] is a bacterium transmitted by the human body louse that causes trench fever. [4] This bacterial species caused outbreaks of trench fever affecting 1 million soldiers in Europe during World War I. [5]
Trench nephritis, also known as war nephritis, is a kidney infection, first recognised by medical officers as a new disease during the early part of the First World War and distinguished from the then-understood acute nephritis by also having bronchitis and frequent relapses. Trench nephritis was the major kidney problem of the war.
Trench fever, also known as five-day fever or quintan fever, is the initial manifestation of B. quintana infection. Clinical manifestations range from asymptomatic infection to severe illness. Classical presentations include a febrile illness of acute onset, headache, dizziness, and shin pain.
The harsh conditions, where trenches were often wet and muddy and the constant company of lice and rats which fed on unburied bodies, often carried disease. Many troops suffered from trench foot, trench fever and trench nephritis. They could also contract frostbite in the winter months and heat exhaustion in the summer. The men were frequently ...
The scene could be 3,000 km (1,860 miles) away in Ukraine's Donbas region, but instead some 2,000 Ukrainian conscripts and veterans are training in the muddy fields of France's eastern Marne ...
The most common of these would be typhus, bartonellosis (also known as trench fever), and leptospirosis. These diseases could take a massive toll on the soldiers, with trench fever possibly pulling a soldier away from the front lines for months at a time. Rats were carriers of lice. Lice can also transmit disease and played a role in spreading ...