Mayo Clinic doctors examine sick pork handlers

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Doctors at the Mayo Clinic say they suspect direct contact with pig brains may have caused to the neurological illnesses of workers at Quality Pork Processing in Austin, Minn. Last week the Minnesota Department of Health revealed 11 workers are exhibiting symptoms.

Pig brains are sold as food, though not commonly.

Workers at Quality Pork Processing used compressed air hoses inserted into the pig's skull cavity to pulverize the brain matter and push it out the snout or the base of the skull.

Some industry experts say the high pressure hoses splattered brain tissue that may also have created a fine mist of brain matter. Workers weren't wearing face masks, so they could have inhaled the material.

The head of Mayo Clinic's Peripheral Nerve Section is Doctor P. James B. Dyck. He has been seeing workers from the Quality Pork Processing plant who have symptoms of a neurological illness.

Dyck says doctors aren't drawing any conclusions yet, but it's possible that contact with neural material could have led to an autoimmune response. That's when the body's immune system attacks itself.

"I think that's a very intriguing idea," he says. "That neural tissue could have perhaps set up some sort of immune response causing this type of neuritis."

Neuritis is the inflammation of the peripheral nervous system. That system controls much of voluntary and involuntary movement, like picking up a pencil or dilating pupils.

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