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Doctors have shared a picture of a 20-year-old woman's hand after the first symptoms of a sexually transmitted disease were spotted when she visited A&E.

The woman had been suffering aches and pains, a fever and trouble with her ankle. When she visited hospital doctors saw blisters in her hands - then also found them on her ankles, armed, legs, torso and scalp.

When she told them she had slept with someone two weeks before without a condom they put the pieces together - and diagnosed gonorrhoea.

Staff say the woman also had swollen ankles and the symptoms indicated a Neisseria gonorrhoeae bacteria infection - which has been treated with antibiotics.

(Image: New England Journal of Medicine)

Dr Melissa Mauskar, writing in the New England Journal of Medicine , said: "At three months of follow-up, the patient was feeling well, with no recurrence of skin lesions or joint pain."

78 million people are diagnosed with gonorrhoea every year across the world, and those aged 15 to 24 are most at risk.

In 2017 there were 44,500 cases in the UK.

Left untreated the infection can spread through the body, leading to a potential skin rash, lesions or blisters.

Swelling and joint pain are other common symptoms along with pain whike urinating and white, green or yellow discharge from the genitals.

There can also be bleeding.