fever

Also known as pyrexia, febrile response, pyrrhexia

Fever or pyrexia in humans is a symptom of an anti-infection defense mechanism that appears with body temperature exceeding the normal range caused by an increase in the body's temperature set point in the hypothalamus. There is no single agreed-upon upper limit for normal temperature: sources use values ranging between in humans.

AI overview

A fever is when your body's temperature rises above normal because your brain's temperature control center increases its set point as part of your body's defense against infection. While there's no single agreed-upon definition of exactly where normal temperature ends and fever begins, this elevated temperature is an important sign that your immune system is responding to fight off illness.

AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.

Key facts

Medical condition.name: Fever
Medical condition.synonyms: Pyrexia, febrile response, febrile
Medical condition.image: Symptoms-fever.jpg
Medical condition.caption: Person with fever
Medical condition.field: Infectious disease, pediatrics
Medical condition.symptoms: Initially: shivering, feeling cold, chillsLater: flushed, sweating
Medical condition.complications: Febrile seizure
Medical condition.causes: Virus, bacteria, increase in the body's temperature set point
Medical condition.diagnosis: Temperature higher than the normal range of
Medical condition.differential: Hyperthermia
Medical condition.treatment: Based on underlying cause, not required for fever itself
Medical condition.medication: Antipyretics (ibuprofen, paracetamol [acetaminophen])
Medical condition.frequency: Common

via Wikipedia infobox

Research

295,960 papers

Neurogenic Fever.ReviewJournal of intensive care medicine · 2017Meier K, Lee KDOI: 10.1177/0885066615625194
Fever of unknown origin: a clinical approach.ReviewThe American journal of medicine · 2015Cunha BA, Lortholary O, Cunha CBDOI: 10.1016/j.amjmed.2015.06.001
Fever--an update.ReviewJournal of the American Podiatric Medical Association · 2010Becker JH, Wu SCDOI: 10.7547/1000281
Fever in travellers returning from the tropics.ReviewMedicina clinica · 2019Jiménez-Morillas F, Gil-Mosquera M, García-Lamberechts EJ et al.DOI: 10.1016/j.medcli.2019.03.017
Periodic fever syndromes.ReviewCurrent opinion in pediatrics · 2000Scholl PRDOI: 10.1097/00008480-200012000-00009
Fever.Pediatrics · 1980Kluger MJ
Fever in the neurosurgical patient.ReviewHeart & lung : the journal of critical care · 1988Cunha BA, Tu RP
Fever in the returning traveler.ReviewEmergency medicine clinics of North America · 2013Kotlyar S, Rice BTDOI: 10.1016/j.emc.2013.07.001

via PubMed

Wikidata facts

Image: Symptoms-fever.jpg

Show 5 more facts

Unicode character: 🤒
Commons category: Fever
ICPC 2 ID: A03
NCI Thesaurus ID: C3038
P8168: Spirostreptida

Sources (3)

via Wikidata · CC0

~25 min read

Article

27 sections

Contents

Associated symptoms
Differential diagnosis
Hyperthermia
Mechanism
Hypothalamus
Pyrogens
Endogenous
Exogenous
Neural circuit mechanism with PGE2 action
Diagnosis
Associated conditions
Types
Hyperpyrexia
Function
Immune function
Advantages and disadvantages
Management
Conservative measures
Medications
Epidemiology
History
Society and culture
Mythology
Pediatrics
Other animals
References
External links

The increase in set point triggers increased muscle contractions and causes a feeling of cold or chills. This results in greater heat production and efforts to conserve heat. When the set point temperature returns to normal, a person feels hot, becomes flushed, and may begin to sweat. Rarely a fever may trigger a febrile seizure, with this being more common in young children. Fevers do not typically go higher than .