The pink swollen finger of the woman was a rare sign of tuberculosis, according to UCSF doctors

A woman who received treatment for pink swelling at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center, was found to be infected with the same bacteria that causes tuberculosis.

According to a report published in the New England Journal of Medicine by doctors Jennifer Mandal and Mary Margaretten of the UCSF, a 42-year-old woman was treated after a week of swelling and pink finger discomfort.

The woman did not report any finger injuries and the doctors found no problem with her bones after an X-ray and CT scan.

The doctors performed a biopsy of her skin tissue and discovered that she had been infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the same bacterium that causes tuberculosis in the lungs.

Other tests have shown that the patient did not have the infection in her lungs or elsewhere in her body.

According to the doctors, the woman was suffering from lupus and was treated with drugs that weakened her immune system and made her more vulnerable to infection.

"Although finger infection is a rare extrapulmonary manifestation of tuberculosis, it is an important consideration in immunocompromised patients," the doctors wrote.

The woman was reportedly infected by her husband, who "was diagnosed with active pulmonary tuberculosis" after a trip to China.

She was treated with four anti-tuberculosis drugs for nine months and her symptoms completely disappeared.

Alert me