An American man in his 50s diagnosed with an advanced form of prostate cancer suddenly found himself sounding like an Irish person, which is a stark change that stuck with him for the rest of his life. The medics in North Carolina who treated him shared clops of his voice before and after the bizarre change, pointing to his cancer as the main culprit, MailOnline reported.
The man died from the deadly disease but before that, doctors diagnosed him with the extraordinarily rare foreign accent syndrome (FAS). The speech disorder usually occurs after a complication from a stroke or head injury and so far there are only two other reports of cancers triggering it. The man's case is the first one linked to prostate cancer.
Man Battling Prostate Cancer Suddenly Develops an Irish Accent: How Real is Foreign Accent Syndrome?
FAS as Rare Complication of Cancer
The team at Duke University Health System presented the patient's case in the British Medical Journal Case Reports, wherein they reported that the man developed a paraneoplastic neurological disorder (PND). It is a rare complication of cancer as the cells fighting the cancer cells mistakenly attack the nervous system.
The condition usually presents itself with muscle movement or coordination problems, although it can also affect cognitive skills. The man received radiotherapy and androgen deprivation therapy over the course of 20 months to treat his prostate cancer. He also revealed that he had never been to Ireland and had never spoken in an Irish accent.
However, he did have Irish family and friends who briefly lived in England during his 20s. Doctors commented that the man's accent was uncontrollable and gradually became persistent. The man never had any head trauma or suffered any psychiatric conditions. More so, the results of an MRI scan of his brain also did not show any abnormalities.
However, a CT scan of his abdomen and pelvis showed that his prostate cancer has spread further. Due to this, he was referred to the Duke Cancer Institute to undergo treatment. But it further developed into neuroendocrine prostate cancer (NEPC), which is a lethal kind of cancer.
Medics said that there are many PNDs presenting symptoms of NEPC. Due to the rapid clinical deterioration of the man, he was moved into a home hospice. The team wrote in the BMJ publication that the man's Irish brogue-like accent was maintained until his death.
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What Is Foreign Accent Syndrome (FAS)?
According to Science Alert, FAS is a rare speech disease that can lead a person to spontaneously adopt a 'foreign' accent, with pronunciation altering in ways that mimic the rhythm of another dialect or language.
Strokes and severe brain injuries are the most prevalent causes of the condition. The most notable example is of a Norwegian lady who suffered a brain injury during the bombing of Oslo in 1941. She began to talk with what sounded like a German accent a few months later. Another case was of a woman from Arizona a few years ago who woke up speaking like "Mary Poppins" with an unknown cause.
FAS cases that are conclusively connected to malignancies are far less prevalent. In fact, only two such cases are given in the literature. The first one is of a lady in her 60s in 2008 who began having an unidentified accent after breast cancer cells went into her brain, while the second case was a woman in her 50s with a brain tumor who started speaking with a different rhythm and melody.
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