Western Diamond Back Rattle - Bite Pictures

[swazi]

Chad, the youngster looking after my reptile park got bitten by our Rattle snake, spent a week in hospital and three weeks at home before he had the strength (and courage I think) to return to work.






Pics fixed - Elapid

[snake-5]

Dam i met him at pure venom, which hospital was he in, that looks nasty how did it happen.

[Bushbaby]

Ouch!!! I'm assuming this is the guy they phoned BV about the anti venom and never got back to him.

That looks so painful. Glad he has recovered. It must've been pretty nasty!! Ouch!!

[swazi]

I got hold of a friend in JHB, he found the anti-venom and suggested we wait to see if it was really needed. Also couldn't arrange a flight at that time of the day. Who is BV?

Chad is allergic to everything and anything, high risk for anti-venom treatment, especially if administered here in Swaziland. He was in the local “farm clinic”, not hospital. It was too dangerous to move him at that stage, the nearest decent hospital is over 2.5 hours away. The local clinic has no specialised equipment; actually, they borrowed my tweezers at one stage but it was our safest and only option.
One good thing for Chad though, they gave him large quantities of Morphine for 5 days. He remembers almost nothing at all of his entire hospital stay.

Chad was feeding late one afternoon using the long feeding tongs. A few latecomers were allowed in; they saw the rattle snake and asked him to make it rattle. Using the same feeding tongs and smelly hands, he opened the back of the box…the rest i'm sure you can imagine. Not Chad’s brightest moment. The snake is still waiting for that strange tasting mouse, according to my son the snake actually wiped its mouth (in disgust I’m sure) after he bit him.

[arcadies]

doesnt seem like a very pleasant experience. glad to hear he is okay!

[Bushviper]

Yeah I had the antivenom on standby and was going to arrange an ambulance to drive it though to you. My initials on the web are BV (Bushviper).

In future rather take a chance and move him. If the hospital has no equipment then they cannot really treat him. Keeping him in a bed and giving him morphine does not really constitute as treatment. He needed to be on a saline or ringers drip the whole time in the hospital.

Luckily he came through this okay. Next time the public want to hear a rattle pre-record the noise on a cell phone and play that back to them.

[Pythonodipsas]

I hope this makes us treat all our rattlers with more respect!

I am glad he made it without losing either life, limb or digit.

[swazi]

Hi BV,

Chad was on a saline drip for the 5 days he was in hospital. The doctor in Swaziland was getting brilliant advice and instructions from several sectors in SA. We were taking photo’s and sending them through on an hourly basis. Moving the anti-venom was a problem, flights from JHB had stopped and the ambulance would have taken 6 hours to get to me. Border close to me closes at 6pm but we had made arrangements to move him or the anti-venom across in case the Dr’s in SA thought it was necessary.

I hear you have freeze-dried anti-venom, would you advise us to do the same here in the bush? Do you belong to a anti-venom bank?

Last week a lady died from a mamba bite, there was no anti-venom at any of the major hospitals (they didn’t try me, could have helped). We keep a substantial stock just in case and will travel to the hospital with our own supply, if heaven forbid, it ever happens again.

[Bushviper]

Okay I just did not see any drip on him and you never mentioned it.

The antivenom I have is my personal supply. Mike just asked me as a favour to make it available to you.

If you can get antivenom for the exotic species it would be better than nothing however it is an expensive insurance policy that you might never cash in on.

There is a general shortage of SAVP antivenom throughout SA as well. It would seem that this should be sorted out by the end of next month.

[mfezi]

is it wyeth or crofab?


Matter of interest, some back to back studies have been done, and the Costa Rican and Mexican antivenin rank much higher that wyeth (which is not made anymore) and comparable to Crofab. One difference, it costs a tenth of crofab, and when it comes down to vials, it would be more effective because you could have more on hand.


Guy to look up is John Perez from Texas a and m that has done a bunch of work here. Its just the hassle about face point of view that anything not made in the states is bad.... stupid , and few people use the central american stuff.

As for advanced life support, an atrox is not a high risk, but south pacifics, mojaves and certain other rattlesnakes have the same potential as Mambas to paralyze the CNS and cause respiratory distress and death... I was on a ventilator in Garden city clinic for 2 days after a south pacific bite in Boksburg... long story. But, in that case, have a protocol on what to do if something like that happens

Also, I work in a hospital, and there is a saying "If you give a surgeon a hammer, everything is a nail"
What that means are surgeons are trained to cut, and thats what they do. I would highly advise against any form of aputation with out a second opinion. Also, if they try and put the fear of infection and necrosis in you, speak to a guy called Grant Jameson at Professional Diving Institute in DBN and look into hyperbaric oxygen therapy, it works, no BS. They wanted to take my arm off for the atrox bite at the end of this post.. now you can barely even notice anything is wrong with the finger


preaching to the choir, i know, but it sucks when you see one of us looking that bad.

best of luck

don

Atrox bite of 99

[snake-5]

Dam man looking at those pics i was dam lucky to come off as i did. But compare it to car accidents and we don't give it a second thought driving to work and back every day. A bad bite only makes one wiser and more cautious wanting to learn more to avoid the possible.

[Bushviper]

Okay Mfezi can you get us some Central and South American antivenom?

If possible it would be nice if it was legal.

If not, I will burn in hell for a second time.

[gaboon]

Excuse my ignorance, but could the shortage of SAVP antivenom be due to its export to other countries?

[mfezi]

I can get it. Weird is that they give it away in costa rica!! Well to reptile parks!
I will do some research about exporting from costa rica straight to sa, by pass usa altogether!

By the way, do you have wyeth?

[Bushviper]

Yip I have the dessicated stuff from Wyeth. It has expired but has been in the fridge all the time. In the event that I need some for a decent bite I would inject it into the drip myself and the doctor can just monitor for anaphylaxis.

Look into the Costa Rica option please. If I have a reptile park here do you think they will give it to me?

For which species is the antivenom effective?