PHN

What is PHN?

PHN is the abbreviation for the term Postherpetic Neuralgia. It is a condition that affects your nerve fibers and skin. This causes you to feel pain all over your body. Postherpetic neuralgia is caused by the complication of shingles. It is considered as the second outbreak of a virus called the varicella-zoster virus, which is the initial cause of Chicken Pox.

What happens is, during the infection of Chicken Pox, some of the virus remains in your body. It does not die but merely lie dormant inside your nerve cells. It is possible, years later, that the virus may reactivate. And this is the cause of shingles.

Once this virus reactivates, it travels along your nerve fibers, thus causing pain. Eventually, the virus reaches your skin. When it does, a rash is produced, and at worse, blisters. Typically, shingles heals within a month. There are some who continuously feel pain after the rash and blisters heal. This is called posterpetic neuralgia. There are no treatments for PHN itself, but pain relievers may be taken to relieve the pain.

How Common is PHN?

The Herpes Zoster (HZ) is a viral infection that most often presents as a childhood infection of varicella. An example of this is with chicken pox. For some people, the virus stays in the body, and will eventually be reactivated, a condition called shingles. The virus is reactivated because of several possible reasons like stress, age and immune system deficiency. The major symptoms of shingles are rashes and blisters on the skin, accompanied with pain. When the blisters and rashes have finally disappeared, but the pain still persists, this is considered as postherpetic neuralgia or PHN.

PHN occurs more likely for people over 50. There are some rare cases when younger people suffer from PHN, but it tends to be mild. PHN tends to develop, and is more likely to be severe for people over 60 years old. In fact, there is 1 for every 4 people aged over 60 who have had shingles, and developed PHN that lasted for more than 30 days. This means, the older you are, the more likely it will occur. The good news is, the early treatment of shingles can possibly reduce your risks of developing PHN.

In the united states alone, the frequency of PHN development one month after the onset of singles is 9-14.3%, and at three months, is at 5%. After a year, 3% continue to suffer from severe pain.

Another factor for herpes zoster is family history. A study conducted indicated that people with multiple blood relatives who have the herpes zoster virus are at a higher risk as compared to those with a single blood relative with herpes zoster.

There are no associations between PHN and sex. Postherpetic neuralgia is not fatal.

Postherpetic Neuralgia – Cause and Treatments

Postherpetic neuralgia is developed after a person has experienced a viral infection called herpes zoster. Once infected with this virus, it could cause two conditions which are chicken pox and shingles. Both of which have small skin blisters as the major symptoms.

The Cause

Chicken pox is a common childhood disease that is caused by the herpes virus. It is highly contagious. There are some people whose immune system is not strong enough to eliminate the virus. It remains inactive in the nerve cells. It is possible that it may be reactivated years later, and may develop into shingles. There are other people who develop shingles during exposure to the herpes zoster virus. This typically happens in adulthood.

As people age, the chances of developing PHN or postherpetic neuralgia is higher. PHN is the continuation of the pain experienced during shingles, even after the rash has healed out. There are several factors that may cause this virus to resurface, like illness, stress, or age.

The virus attacks the sensory nerve fibers, and this is what causes the pain. When the virus eventually reaches the skin, it will cause a rash, along with blisters, and this is known as shingles.

Not every person who gets shingles will develop postherpetic neuralgia, nor does it develop after chicken pox. The skin lesions from shingles will heal one to three months later. For some people, the pain still continues even after the skin irritation has healed. If this pain lasts for more than three months, then this is probably postherpetic neuralgia.

The Treatments

There is currently no treatment for PHN. Also, there may be similar symptoms like sharp burning, pain, sensitivity to temperature change and touch, itching and numbness, however, the duration differs from person to person. For most, the condition improves over time. More than half will cease to feel the pain within a year.

While there is no treatment for PHN, there are drugs that may help with the symptoms felt. Some who suffer from PHN are prescribed with emollients and topical steroids. Because of the possible side-effects, and sometimes lack of success with these treatments, others also opt for anti-inflammatory calming sesquiterpenes complimented by antispasmolytic esters and regenerative diketones, ingredients that are known to have pain-reducing and analgesic properties that relieve postherpetic neuralgia symptoms.

PHN No More is a certified 100% organic, all-natural treatment that is remarkably effective for dealing with PHN symptoms and pain. The organically grown azulunes in PHN No More have the demonstrated capacity to calm the nervous system, PHN tension and pain in the nerve endings. It is effective for so many sufferers of Postherpetic Neuralgia that it comes with a full one-year, unconditional money back guarantee.