Dengue fever

For a lay person:

Dengue is a viral infection spread by mosquitoes in tropical and subtropical regions. It causes sudden high fever, severe headache, pain behind the eyes and aching muscles and joints. A small number of people develop severe dengue with bleeding.

For a trained medical person:

A flavivirus infection transmitted by Aedes mosquitoes, from febrile illness to severe dengue with plasma leakage, haemorrhage and shock, usually around defervescence. Management is supportive with careful fluid monitoring; NSAIDs are avoided.

In Chinese medicine:

Flaws and Sionneau's textbook differentiates this condition into these patterns: Warm evils depressed in the exterior; Qi heat blazing and exuberant; Qi and constructive both ablaze; Heat sinking-righteous deserting; Lung-stomach yin damage. Treatment follows the pattern a patient presents with, not the Western diagnosis alone.

When to get help: Get emergency care for severe abdominal pain, persistent vomiting, bleeding, drowsiness or restlessness, especially as the fever settles.