Viral Meningitis: Examination

A comprehensive clinical examination is the basis for selecting further diagnostic steps:

• General physical examination – including blood pressure, pulse, body temperature, body weight, body height; furthermore:
  • Inspection (viewing).
    • Skin, mucous membranes and sclerae (white part of the eye).
  • Palpation (palpation) of the abdomen (abdomen) (tenderness?, knocking pain?, coughing pain?, defensive tension?, hernial orifices?, kidney bearing knocking pain?).
• Neurological examination [due tosymptom: meningismus (painful neck stiffness)] [due todifferential diagnoses:
  • Bacterial meningoencephalitis (combined inflammation of the brain (encephalitis) and meninges (meningitis) triggered by bacteria).
  • Chronic meningitis (meningitis, which can be triggered by many different pathogens; these include Borrelia, Treponema pallidum (syphilis) or the HI virus).
  • Empyema (collection of pus in a body cavity; can occur in the skull subdurally (under the hard meninges) and epidurally (on the hard meninges))
  • Encephalitis (inflammation of the brain).
  • Brain abscess (accumulation of pus in the brain (headache, nausea, vomiting, epileptic seizures, clouding of consciousness)).
  • Meningitis (as a complication of various systemic diseases such as sarcoidosis (synonyms: Boeck’s disease; Schaumann-Besnier’s disease; systemic disease of connective tissue (skin, lungs and lymph nodes) with granuloma formation) or in the context of pneumonia)]

Square brackets [ ] indicate possible pathologic (pathological) physical findings.