antivenom - Experts Forum at VenomousReptiles.org

antivenom	Reply
by craig3758 on July 25, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
O-kay is it just immpossible to get antivenom as a private collector?I would like to get my own supply,but can't find ant cooperation.Any help guys?

RE: antivenom	Reply
by sceniccityreptiles on July 25, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
I see you live in GA, I assume you are keeping North American Pit Vipers exclusively. You will need Polyvalent crotalid antivenom ( CroFab ), Ovine, Fab or Antivipmyn (Bioclon). Both are approved drugs by the FDA. (CroFab I know for sure, Bioclon I have heard, but not seen in writing) Since they are approved medicines, the process is more simple then importing experimental medicines from third world nations. Both of these Antivenoms are available thru: Protherics Inc. (US) 615-327-1027 1207 17th Avenue South Suite 103, Nashville Tennessee 37212 You will need a prescription from a doctor to legally purchase or process either. I am not sure if you are aware of this, but medium level envenomations call for an initial doses of 6 vials of CroFab and severe envenomations call for a first dose of 10 vials. The wholesale price on CroFab is $950/vail. You are looking at a very expensive undertaking.

RE: antivenom	Reply
by craig3758 on July 25, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
Yes I'm aware of the expense,but it's still cheaper than the hospital.I appreciate the info the doctors perscription must have been what I was missing!I've kept snakes for years,but have gotten quite a large collection now and I want to be better prepared

RE: antivenom	Reply
by LarryDFishel on July 25, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
If it's the price alone you are worried about, there are a couple of things you need to understand. 1) You have to go to the hospital anyway, and pay for everything except the antivenom. 2) Antivenom has a limited shelf life. Unless you plan to get biiten more than once every 3 years or so, you won't save any money, and even then it will only be whatever markup they put on the antivenom. If you live in area where the hopsitals might not have antivenom on hand, it might be worthwhile though.

RE: antivenom	Reply
by LarryDFishel on July 25, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
P.S. It might be worth your time to contact the local hospitals and see what they charge for AV, and how much they keep on hand (if you can get anyone to tell you). If they charge $3000 a vial, you can safely ignore most of my last post...

RE: antivenom	Reply
by sceniccityreptiles on July 25, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
Actually, $3000/vail is about the going price. But, in most cases if the hospital has their own, they are going to insist on using it. In this age of lawsuits, you are not going to get a physician to eject a medicine that someone brought in off the street. I don’t see that you are going to save any money stocking your own AV for North American snakes. I am not DNR, so if you are keeping cobras of something of that nature, you may need to stock your own. Getting that is a different story, you are going to need federal paperwork need import and keep that. If that is the case, contact me off line.

RE: antivenom	Reply
by Phobos on July 26, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
Hi: The only available antivenom for North American Crotalids is CroFab. Wyeth & CroFab are currently the only FDA approved A/V in the US and Wyeth is only replacing hospital stocks as it is used. Biclon is currently undergoing a limited clinical trials in Tucson under the AZ poison control centers supervision. Realistical if all goes well maybe in two to three years it will get FDA approval. Most hospitals will not even use your A/V if you bring it with you to the hospital when bitten. They will get it from a Zoo instead where they know it was at least stored properly. They will not take on the libility of giving a drug that they can't say for sure was stored correctly. Al Coritz www.neavb.org

RE: antivenom	Reply
by Chance on July 26, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
"Most hospitals will not even use your A/V if you bring it with you to the hospital when bitten. They will get it from a Zoo instead where they know it was at least stored properly. They will not take on the libility of giving a drug that they can't say for sure was stored correctly." If the above statement is correct, then all the bickering and warring inside the hot community over keeping one's own AV is pointless! I've argued in the past against keeping your own AV for reasons similar to this and others, and was torn apart. Of course it'd great to have as backup incase the hospital can't get any, but if there's a zoo or serpentarium within a reasonable distance, who do you think they're going to go with? So why keep fighting about this issue? -Chance

RE: antivenom	Reply
by Phobos on July 26, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
Chance: This is why the Anitvenom bank principle works best. The A/V stocks are kept at a regional medical center (or with a dedicated EMT squad) with the logistic support as well as a staff that knows the correct snakebite treatment protocols. Too many local doctors still want to put your hand or leg in the Cusinart to relieve "Compartmental pressure syndrome" which is more imaginary than an actual problem with 99% of snakebites. Best, Al www.neavb.org

RE: antivenom	Reply
by Chance on July 26, 2005	Mail this to a friend!
Agreed. Unfortuately, we are all (you especially) seeing how difficult it is to get a regional AV bank up and running. Everyone thinks yeah, it's a great idea. But how many people actually put in the needed funds to get on board? My guess is maybe 1 in 10 or 1 in 15 who keep venomous and live in the bank's area. Heck, maybe I'm even inflating those made-up statistics. People are always willing to say a lot more than they are willing to do. Because it is apparent that regional AV banks are going to be hard to get started, if not impossible in some cases, I'm somewhat doubtful of many of them popping up around the country. -Chance

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