A man discovered he had been living with just half a brain after being hit by a common symptom that plagues millions.
The unnamed 44-year-old from the south of France started feeling a mild pain and weakness in his leg for around two weeks, which prompted him to visit his doctor.
More than a third of Americans suffer from some form of leg pain, which is usually down to muscle strain, arthritis or harder-to-identify causes, like vascular issues.
After doctors ruled out those common physical causes, they were concerned it could be due to a neurological condition that affects nerve endings.
While there weren’t any notable abnormalities in his medical history, they noticed that he had had a shunt surgery when he six months old.
A shunt surgery – which involves implanting a thin tube into the brain to drain away excess fluid to another part of the body – was performed as he had an excess buildup of fluid on his brain but there was no cause identified.
The shunt was then removed when he was 14 years old. After the doctors ran CT and MRI scans of his head, they were shocked to find a huge pocket of fluid where his brain was meant to be.
In scans shared with medical journal The Lancet, the main part of the man’s brain area appears black, indicating where the build up of fluid was.
A man discovered he had been living with just half a brain after being hit by leg pain. The above image shows a build up of fluid – the black area – where his brain was mean to be
The drainage tubes in the patient’s brain had narrowed, causing a build up of fluid to accumulate over the decades.
This caused his brain to squeeze into a narrow layer pushed against the rim of his skull.
As a result, his skull had also enlarged.
Your browser does not support iframes.
Commenting on the case, Lionel Feuillet, a neurologist at the Mediterranean University in Marseilles, said at the time the case report was published in 2004: ‘We were very surprised when we looked for the first time the CT scan.
‘The brain was very, very much smaller than normal. This case is unique to our knowledge.’
Dr Feuillet said that his team had ‘never encountered such severe hydrocephalus before’ and it is likely the man had the condition from birth.
In a bid to see how his condition had affected his mental ability, the doctors carried out a series of psychological tests on the male patient.
They were further surprised to find that he was still able to function sufficiently with an IQ of 75, at the lower end of the ‘normal’ range.
The man also had built a successful life for himself, with a wife, two children and a job as a civil servant.
After treatment, the man made a complete recovery although subsequent scans showed no change to the size of his brain
Scans revealed only a narrow rim of brain material pressed against the man’s skull
Dr Feuillet said that the problems with his left leg were a neurological symptom of the man’s brain condition.
In the US, hydrocephalus or ‘water on the brain’ affects one out of every 770 babies, making it as common as Down syndrome and more common than spina bifida or brain tumors.
The condition is most common in both infants and older adults and it can be asymptomatic, which explains why the man went for years without noticing an impact to his health.
Some of the common symptoms, when they do surface, include headaches, nausea and vomiting, difficulty walking, vision problems, memory problems, incontinence and seizures.
Treatment is shunt surgery and if it is left untreated, hydrocephalus can be fatal due to increased pressure compressing the brainstem, which is responsible for regulating heart rates and breathing.
A patient’s prognosis after surgery depends on their age and general health.
After treatment, the man made a complete recovery although subsequent scans showed no change to the size of his brain.
