You Made the Diagnosis -- Scurvy!

Jan. 24, 2007 — -- Diana Wyman's life is all about routine -- and it's a routine she says she loves.

Wyman lives deep in the woods of New Hampshire, where she spends her days caring for her husband of 37 years and their son. She also raises llamas -- five of them!

"I take care of them all by myself, morning and night," she says.

Wyman says feeding, cleaning and maintaining the llamas' pastures and taking them for walks is a full-time job. So when she developed an ear infection and started feeling weak, she wasn't about to let that get in the way of what she had to do.

Her doctor put her on antibiotics for her infection and sent her home. Wyman, who's suffered from severe food allergies for years, had a bad reaction to the antibiotics. Within several weeks she'd lost 10 pounds.

"By then she was getting so tired," Diana's husband Curtis recalls. "She was sleeping 18 hours a day."

Watch the story on "Primetime: Medical Mysteries" Wednesday at 10 p.m. ET, and log onto ABCNEWS.com during the show to make your own diagnosis.

"I was exhausted," Wyman remembers. She also says she'd started to develop a strange rash.

"It was a discoloration, but you couldn't feel anything," Curtis Wyman says.

Eventually the rash got worse, spreading from Diana's knees down her legs -- and it started to burn. Around this same time, Curtis remembers his wife making comments that her gums would bleed whenever she brushed her teeth.

Headed for the Emergency Room

Wyman was determined not to let her deteriorating health slow her down. "I kept pushing and pushing myself," she says.

Life continued as normal for her until she woke up one morning and says she was overcome with excruciating pain.

"I tried to walk to the bathroom and I couldn't make it," she says. "I took two steps and just couldn't take anymore. It just hurt too bad."

Wyman's physician told her to go straight to the ER. She couldn't walk -- she was in so much pain her husband had to carry her inside the hospital.

"Her legs from the knees down were just completely black and blue," Curtis says.

Dr. Osei Bonsu was on call at Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center when Wyman arrived.

"She had lost some weight. She felt weak, and she had rashes on her legs and feet," Bonsu says.

When doctors took Diana's personal history, her 17-year smoking habit was a concern. Dr. Bonsu considered a possible cancer diagnosis.

"If you have cancer that's spread all over, to your spine, to your liver, and in your blood vessels, those blood vessels could get blocked, and you could get swelling in your legs," he says.

Linked to the Llamas?

Doctors were also intrigued by Wyman's exotic pets. Was there a connection between her strange symptoms and her llamas? Was there some animal-borne illness llamas carried that the doctors had never heard of?

The differentials in Diana's case were extensive. Her team of doctors was also worried about potential blood clots.

"In her case, it could have been vasculitis," Bonsu says, referring to a potentially deadly inflammation in the body's circulatory system. Doctors ordered a CT scan and ultrasound to probe further.

"Nobody really knew or had any idea what was causing what was going on," Diana's husband Curtis says. "At that point, it got really serious."

"Primetime" gave you a chance to be the doctor. What do you think Diana is suffering from?

A. A nutritional deficiency

B. An infection, possibly caused by Diana's llamas

C. Cancer

D. A circulatory disease, such as vasculitis

Watch "Primetime: Medical Mysteries" for more clues, and make your own diagnosis during the show. Stay tuned to the end of the show for the real diagnosis.

The Real Diagnosis

Test results showed that Diana did not have any blood clots, and Dr. Bonsu called in other physicians and specialists. The doctors were all shocked by how swollen her legs were.

"They were blowing up," Diana said. "And I couldn't really wiggle the toes. When I tried to stand up on the feet…it was like I had boots on."

Doctors continued to suspect a possible animal-to-human disease from the llamas.

"They were drawing blood out of her like a sieve and pumping it back in," said Curtis Wyman, "And every three hours, they were drawing another vial out to send off for another test."

The situation became so severe that surgeons were consulted about relieving the swelling, and the hospital's senior internist was brought in to consult on the case.

He began to focus his questions on Diana's diet, and discovered that it was very restricted. She didn't eat citrus fruits because they upset her stomach, and she also avoided soy and milk.

"I can name what she eats on five fingers, pretty much," said Curtis.

The interist suspected that Diana was suffering from scurvy. The other doctors were surprised, as was husband Curtis.

"Scurvy? The first thing you think of…people coming over on ships," he said. "We have plenty of food in the house. Why would you get scurvy?"

Scurvy is equivalent to vitamin C deficiency. Vitamin C is essential to construct strong collagen tissues in blood vessels, joints, muscles and the heart.

"[Doctors] dumped in two IV's, one in each arm, of vitamin C. And within twelve hours, it started to make a big difference," said Curtis.

Diana began to take supplements and to see a nutritionist, and she's now healthy. If you chose option "A," a nutritional deficiency, you were right.