prescription - a drug that is available only with written instructions from a doctor or dentist to a pharmacist; he told the doctor that he had been taking his prescription regularly. ethical drug, prescription drug, prescription medicine.
Definition. Shingles is a viral infection that causes a painful rash. Although shingles can occur anywhere on your body, it most often appears as a single stripe of blisters that wraps around either the left or the right side of your torso. Shingles is caused by the varicella-zoster virus â the same virus that causes chickenpox. After you've had chickenpox, the virus lies inactive in nerve tissue near your spinal cord and brain. Years later, the virus may reactivate as shingles. While it isn't a life-threatening condition, shingles can be very painful.
Of those cases, about half occur in people 60 years of age or older. Shingles occur in 2 stages. The early stage of shingles -- called the prodromal stage -- begins 3 to 4 days before the rash appears. Early symptoms resemble those of the common cold, including headache, nausea, general achiness, abdominal pain, fatigue, fever and chills. As shingles progresses, more severe symptoms begin to develop. The next stage of shingles is called the eruptive stage. Pain is usually the first symptom.