Your bones, muscles, skin, and senses form an intricate network that holds your body up, keeps it moving, protects it, and brings messages to your brain that help it function. From time to time, though, your bod may not be running at top speed, and one of these systems may be the culprit.
Sure, typical ailments like joint pain, broken bones, and skin rashes can wreak havoc on this network of systems. But don’t forget about the rarer issues that can pop up as well. Many of these have names as singular as the pioneering doctors and scientists for whom they are named. Check out what might be knocking around under your hood:
Anghelescu: Inability to bend the spine while lying on the back
Auspitz: Appearance of bleeding spots when psoriasis scales are scraped off
Babinski: Loss of Achilles tendon reflex in sciatica
Bertolotti: Sacralization of the 5th lumbar vertebra, with sciatica and scoliosis
Bloch-Sulzberger: Genetic disorder that affects skin, hair, nails, and teeth with skin blistering and wart-like rash
Dalrymple: A widened eyelid opening or eyelid spasm, seen in Graves’ disease
Darier: Change observed after stroking the skin of a person with urticaria pigmentosa; skin becomes swollen, red, and itchy
Gougerot-Blum (pigmented purpuric lichenoid dermatitis): Skin condition characterized by small rust-colored papules on the legs, primarily seen in men
Hailey-Hailey (familial benign pemphigus): Genetic disorder causing blisters to form on the skin
Hennebert: Nystagmus when positive or negative pressure is applied to tympanic membrane indicating labyrinthitis
Jendrassik: Paralysis of the extraocular muscles
Kiloh-Nevin: Ocular myopathy
Klippel-Trenaunay: A rare condition of one extremity characterized by hypertrophy of bone and soft tissue
Maisonneauve: Hyperextensibility of the hand, indicating a Colles' fracture
Milkman (also called Looser-Milkman): Bone disease with transparent stripes of absorption in long and flat bones
Naftziger: Condition of cervical muscle spasm secondary to intervertebral disk disease
Quinquaud (decalvaris folliculitis): Inflammation of hair follicles, resulting in loss of hair, red scalp, and pustules around hair follicles
Ramsay-Hunt (Herpes zoster oticus): Shingles infection affecting the facial nerve close to the ear
Schwartz-Jampel: Genetic disorder causing myotonia
Usher: Condition that affects both hearing and vision, with hearing loss and progressive loss of vision
Von Graefe: An immobility or lagging of upper eyelid, seen in Graves’ disease
Weber-Christian: Condition characterized by recurrent subcutaneous nodules that heal with depression of the overlying skin