Corey Perry and Francois Beauchemin are nearing their returns to the Anaheim Ducks as the team physician Dr. Craig Milhouse received their official diagnoses Wednesday night: The mumps.
Perry, who has missed four games, is cleared of the disease and will resume workouts with the team Thursday. Beauchemin is currently hospitalized in order to receive IV fluids, the same treatment that Perry had, and is expected to be back with the team later in the week.
"(Perry) can be around the team now. He is not contagious, he is cleared of the disease at this point," Milhouse said. "(Beauchemin) is a couple, about three days behind him."
The two were initially diagnosed with viral gland infections, prompting Milhouse to take viral cultures from both of them. The results of the swab came back positive for mumps. All of the players had been previously vaccinated for the disease as kids but the antibodies can decrease with age.
For precautionary measures, the entire team and staff will receive the MMR vaccination. Their cases were reported to both the Orange County Department of Health and the Centers for Disease Control.
"We're going to be ordering these things in the next day and we're supposed to be giving them in a few days," Milhouse said. "I've talked to the CDC and the health department is involved because they have to be, the mumps is a reportable infection."
Uncommon, yes, but not completely unheard of anymore, according to Milhouse, but it's still nearly impossible to determine just how exactly the two caught the virus, but the flu took its turn around the Anaheim dressing room and is spread in the same manor.
"There have been some increase in mumps in the last couple years," he said. "The mumps, as I said, is carried in the saliva. It's not going to be in the locker room, on the training table, or anything like that. It comes from transfers from people-to-people - sharing drinking glasses, silverware. It is a contagious disease and that's why we are giving vaccinations."
