The Sunday News
Tinomuda Chakanyuka, Senior Reporter
TUESDAY 14 March 2017 is a day Ms Georgina Shumba* would want to forget, yet she remembers very little if anything about the day.
A paradox of sorts, but this may as well sum up what the 40-year-old mother of two went through on the fateful day. She suffered a bout of a rare disease, Encephalitis, and momentarily lost her marbles, so to speak. It could have been a fatal encounter had she delayed seeking medical assistance.
In a society where superstition often reigns over science, a cocktail of theories flew to explain her sudden affliction. Ms Shumba’s “recollection” of the day’s events is largely aided by accounts given by her kin. She remembers little. The accounts are also based on conjecture, suppositions and hypotheses stitched together as no one really knows what transpired.
Ms Shumba last recalls knocking off from work around 6pm and being dropped off in town by a work colleague. She works in the public relations department of a parastatal which is under the Ministry of Health and Child Care in Harare. What happened between the time she dropped off the commuter omnibus and the time she arrived home in Chitungwiza around 3am the next day remains a mystery.
It is suspected that she, in a moment of mental disorientation wandered around the dormitory town for hours. She was supposedly looking for her way home, where obviously her family had already been jerked into panic mode. Ms Shumba’s family believes a Good Samaritan police officer, whose name she intermittently called out, helped her find the way home. Her arriving home in the wee hours of the morning, wearing her jacket inside out, visibly tired and disoriented, heightened panic among her kin.
“I wandered until 3am as I couldn’t find my way home. I can hardly remember what really happened. What I remember is I dropped off last and I had long passed where I was supposed to have dropped off,” said Ms Shumba.
She added: “I thank God I realised that I decided not to drive home. I left my car at work. When I got home, which I don’t know how, I could not recognise my family members. I couldn’t talk but felt I had so much energy to walk.”
Ms Shumba’s sister-in-law Wadzanai* recounted the shock and torment that gripped their family as their relative went through her ordeal after arriving at home during “witching hours”.
“Everyone was in panic mode. We were clueless but we could see that something was totally wrong with her,” said Wadzanai.
“At first we suspected that she had been raped but as we interviewed her we noticed that she was disoriented. She was speaking incoherently and hardly made any sense. She was confused, seemingly in a different world,” she said.
Wadzanai said at that time, everyone in the house, including Ms Shumba’s husband, brother and younger sister made their own conclusions which they however, didn’t share at that time.
“Of course everyone came up with their own theory which they kept to themselves. You can’t rule out suspicions of witchcraft in such situations. What we however, agreed on was that she be taken to hospital immediately,” she said.
Ms Shumba was taken to Parirenyatwa Group of Hospitals in Harare before being referred to Baines Avenue Clinic for further treatment.
“Several other tests were conducted and the doctors concluded that she suffered from encephalitis,” said Wadzanai. Ms Shumba said she was grateful that her family managed to get her timeous medical attention, as many people die of the disease due to delayed medical intervention.
“Fortunately I got a good neurologist. Many people die without getting medical attention as people are quick to suspect witchcraft whenever a relative shows signs of encephalitis,” she said.
After being successfully treated over a couple of days, Ms Shumba passed out for almost eight hours. Again her family panicked.
“I think it was due to fatigue. I suspect I must have covered a long distance. Some can stray for 20 kilometres if not more,” she said. Ms Shumba’s sister Millicent, who watched her sister going through hell and back, said she at some point thought her elder sister was dying.
“It was a traumatic experience we went through as a family. I had never seen anyone close to me in that sort of state. To be honest I thought she would die. What made the feeling worse was that I was helpless,” said Millicent.
Dr Gift Gwende, who attended to Ms Shumba, explained what encephalitis is.
“Encephalitis is diffuse inflammation of the brain substance (as opposed to meningitis which is inflammation of the covering membranes of the brain and spinal cord). Often the two conditions occur together as meningo-encephalitis,” he said.
Dr Ngwende highlighted some of the causes of encephalitis.
“Encephalitis is not a single disease. It is a collective descriptive term and has multiple causes. Some of the causes include viral infections, non-infectious causes such as autoimmune conditions, and bacteria such as mycoplasma. Parasitic causes include toxoplasma that occurs in immuno-compromised patients,” he said.
Ms Shumba said she suspects that severe stress might have led to her suffering from the disease.
“Stress causes the disease to manifest. It can be dormant for years before it manifests. That’s what my doctors told me. I think mine was caused mainly by stress,” she said.
Dr Ngwende said while the actual incidence of the disease in Zimbabwe was not known, it remained a rare illness. He said the symptoms of encephalitis include altered mental status (drowsiness, confusion), personality changes, convulsions, paralysis of one side of the body, poor balance and coma in severe cases.
“The signs and symptoms are a reflection of diffuse brain dysfunction and include neuropsychological features. The prevalence in Zimbabwe and pretty much many countries is unknown. The true incidence is unknown. In general encephalitis is not common,” he said.
Dr Ngwende said the disease could be diagnosed in a number of ways.
“Useful investigations include doing a lumbar puncture in order to access the brain fluid (cerebrospinal fluid — CSF) to identify the infecting organism.
A magnetic resonance imaging scan (MRI) of the brain is typically very useful in making the diagnosis.
“Currently there are no MRI scans in all the public hospitals in Zimbabwe (Harare has five machines in the private sector and Bulawayo has one private sector machine),” he said.
Ms Shumba was successfully treated and returned to work in a week’s time. She is, to date, carrying out her duties and feeling as normal as she could ever be. On Tuesday last week, the world commemorated World Mental Health Day whose theme this year was “Mental health in the workplace”.
An estimated 25 percent of the country’s population suffers from depression which is one of factors that contribute to mental illnesses. — @irielyan
