How to recognize the symptoms of shingles?
It often starts with a general feeling of unease: fatigue, mild fever, chills, headaches… Then, more specifically:
- A burning or tingling sensation in an area of skin, often on one side of the body.
- A red rash that turns into blisters.
- Severe nerve pain, sometimes very troublesome in daily life .
- Hypersensitivity to touch in the affected area.
A few days later, the blisters rupture, dry up, and form a crust. This can last two to four weeks.
Shingles: More than just a pimple
In addition to the rash, shingles can leave behind after-effects, the most feared of which is postherpetic neuralgia: chronic pain that persists even after the skin has healed. Other, rarer complications include vision problems (if the eyes are affected), facial paralysis, or, in rare cases, brain damage.
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