Doubts on Scabies Diagnosis Emerge

The bugs responsible for the scabies scare may have burrowed into Pennypacker residents’ lives, but not actually into their skin.

The initial diagnosis of scabies may have been incorrect, according to an e-mail sent from University Health Services (UHS) doctors to residents Wednesday afternoon. While the cause of the skin ailments of at least five of the Pennypacker residents remains unknown, bed bugs and mosquitoes have been ruled out.

The original source, scabies or otherwise, has now been eradicated from the freshman dormitory, said the e-mail, which was signed by UHS Chief of Medicine Soheyla D. Gharib and staff physician Gregory Johnson.

Pennypacker resident Erika M. Lovin ’11 said she was happy the “self-induced quarantine” was over.

She said when she walked into the Eliot dining hall with a friend who was wearing a bright yellow Pennypacker shirt, they were met with strange looks.

“Now, I can wear my Pennypacker shirt with pride,” she said.

Scabies, a highly contagious but treatable skin disease, is caused by mites that burrow under the skin and lay eggs. The disease leaves a rash, tiny blisters, or bumps on the skin, though symptoms may not appear for four to six weeks after exposure.

Because the disease is spread through direct skin-to-skin contact or through clothes and bedding, UHS instructed everyone to launder their clothing, bedding, and shoes. Anything that was not washed had to remain tied in a plastic bag for 14 days, and students had to apply Permethrin insecticide cream to their entire body for eight to 14 hours.

Facilities Maintenance Operations cleaned every room in the dorm to prevent the spread of the disease.

“The good thing was our rooms got vacuumed and cleaned for free by people in white jumpsuits,” said Lovin.

After the dorm was preventively treated, no new cases occurred in Pennypacker. The UHS memo explained that the best diagnosis that could be given at the time was that the students had contracted scabies, and following standard procedure, they treated the entire dormitory.

Four days afterward an entomologist talked to the students and said that the cause could have been mosquitoes. The physician who saw the bites in the initial diagnosis thought they were more consistent with scabies than mosquitoes.

UHS made a “presumptive” but not “definitive” diagnosis, the e-mail said. Neither Gharib or Johnson returned calls for comment.

One student said she understood UHS’ concern and proactive measures.

“It’s never any fun taking medication unnecessarily,” said Diana C. Marin ’11, but she added that it was a “necessary nuisance.”

Some students were less concerned about the inconvenience than the still mysterious diagnosis.

“I was more worried that they don’t know what caused it,” Victoria Hung ’11 said. “If it wasn’t scabies, and it wasn’t mosquitoes, what was it?