Voronezh man found to have rare Whipple's disease after years of suffering

An extremely rare disease was detected in a resident of Voronezh Region who had been living with joint and abdominal pain for seven years. This was reported by the regional Ministry of Health on 30 October.

The now 38-year-old man first began experiencing symptoms of the disease back in 2017. Initially, his arm and leg joints started hurting. After some time, his abdomen began to ache, and later symptoms included bloating, rumbling, and frequent trips to the toilet. Because of this, the Voronezh resident almost stopped leaving his home.

In an attempt to understand what was wrong with him, the man regularly consulted doctors, but the prescribed treatment provided no relief. In 2024, after another flare-up and a sharp rise in temperature, he was hospitalized in a district hospital. At first, they were able to stabilize him, but soon his condition worsened. His temperature rose to 40 degrees Celsius (104°F), and the abdominal pain prevented him from moving. The patient was urgently transferred to Regional Hospital No. 1.

Only there were doctors able to determine what was wrong with the man — for this, they had to discard several preliminary diagnoses and perform a microscopic analysis of tissue samples from the small and large intestines. It turned out that the Voronezh resident has Whipple«s disease — a rare intestinal disease caused by the bacterium Tropheryma whipplei. It occurs in 0.5 to 1 cases per million people.

“Without long-term antimicrobial therapy, it leads to a fatal outcome. The disease primarily affects the small intestine but can involve the musculoskeletal system, nervous system, and heart, which explains the variety of symptoms observed in the patient. Most often, the disease is diagnosed in people aged 40 to 50 years,” said Irina Podstavkina, chief freelance gastroenterologist of the Ministry of Health and head of the gastroenterology department of VOKB No. 1.

After determining the diagnosis, doctors were able to select antimicrobial therapy for the patient. Almost immediately, the man«s condition began to stabilize. He is now under the observation of gastroenterologists, with high chances of full recovery.