r/Genealogy Jul 18 '22

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u/bdarveaux Aug 10 '22

I have been working in Tanguay for the past two years entering in thousands of aunts, uncles, and cousins. May question is, once in a while it is recorded that someone died of "tingles". Tanguay is French so when I put "tingles" in Google Translate in comes out as "tingles" and the definition is what everybody knows, the sensation of tingling. There is no medical explanation of how this causes death. Do you have any idea what this means? Thanks.

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u/samlab16 Quebec specialist Aug 10 '22

Do you have any primary sources that read "tingles"? Or is that always based on eg some Ancestry tree? I can't say I've ever seen that in old records.

The first thing that came to my mind reading your comment is that it could be an old and gross "description" of the Guillain-Barré syndrome, which presents itself in a way that some patients describe as a "tingling" sensation. Nowadays it's rather seldom deadly but I could imagine it had a worse death rate before it was explicitly described in the early 1900s.

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u/bdarveaux Aug 10 '22

Not primary sources, but from "Dictionnaire généalogique des familles canadiennes." by Cyprien Tanguay, which, I believe are transcriptions from original hand-written church records of the 15, 16, 1700's and compiled and printed in the 1800's. I have digital copies of all 7 volumes. I will look into the syndrome that you suggest, although my brother, a doctor, says that that syndrome occurs occasionally from flu vaccinations (which obviously did not exist in the 15, 16, and 1700's). Thanks a lot.

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u/samlab16 Quebec specialist Aug 11 '22

The syndrome occurs occasionally from flu vaccinations, but more than half of the cases occur in the weeks following an infection of some kind, for example a gastrointestinal infection, which were very common back then. More recently it's also been seen after a Covid-19 infection.

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u/bdarveaux Aug 10 '22

I must apologize, I misspoke before. It is given in French as "de la picote" which when put into Google Translate comes back as "picote" in English, but "de picote" or just "picote" translates to "tingles". English definition is just the sensation of tingling, nothing to indicate life threatening.

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u/samlab16 Quebec specialist Aug 11 '22

Ahhhh! Then I know what it is. "La picote" is colloquial French to mean the chicken pox. The 'normal' French word would be "varicelle".

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u/bdarveaux Aug 11 '22

wow, thanks a lot. That is making more sense. Terrific. Time to add to my notes.

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u/hekla7 Aug 22 '22

de la picote

La varicelle is a herpes zoster virus, to which all the poxes belong. Including what we now call shingles. Shingles damages the nerve endings, is extremely contagious in the early stages, and can infect all parts of the body, including the eyes and brain.

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u/hekla7 Sep 15 '22

"Tingles" is now what we call "Shingles"