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RE: Residual Effects from Copperhead Bite
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by didntseeit on May 31, 2015
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Hello,
I just posted about copperhead bites as I didn't see your post. I was bitten 2 weeks ago on a finger and given 6 vials of av. I have been experiencing back pain and arm pain and after reading your post and the replies to your post I, too, am wondering...is it the snakebite or the av that is causing the pain? The hospital staff thought I was crazy complaining about the excruciating pain in my back after being bitten in the finger....maybe they need to be educated as to what the side-effects of av are! I hope your friend finds some answers and some relief from her pain soon!
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RE: Residual Effects from Copperhead Bite
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by HawkEyeHash on June 21, 2018
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I was bitten by a copperhead on 6/5/18. I was in Table Rock State Park in South Carolina. We saw the full grown 3' snake curled up on the ground next to the trail. I've played with snakes for much of my life. I caught it, picked it up and took a picture with it. One of the guys in my group then wanted a picture, so I showed him how to hold it and we took a picture of him holding it. As he went to hand it back to me, he pulled his hand back and it bit me twice on my right hand. I received on shallow bit on my right forefinger and a deeper bit on my thumb.
The minute I was bit, I the pain was much worse than over poisonous snake bit's I've received and it bled more as well. Having read up about being bitten by poisonous snakes, I knew I needed to get to the hospital and not panic. So I then had a 25 minute drive to a small hospital in Pickens, SC. As I drove there I could feel the poisen crawling up my hand and arm. I applied hard pressure to the bit areas and breathed slowly to try to slow my heart rate down.
They administered anti-venom to me about 30 mins after arriving at the hospital, so I received it around 1 hour from the time of bite. They also administered pain killer, as the pain in my fingers, hand and arm felt like I was dipping my arm in fire. My hand an fingers began to swell up.
12 hours into the ordeal, they thought I might lose the tip of my thumb, as it went quite black. 24 hours into the ordeal I met with a great doctor there who said I was lucky how well the anti-venom worked, as the swelling was far less than he normally saw. He cut holes around each bite area and then grooves along the area where the toxin had spread, which then continued to bleed out the next week and allow a lot of the toxin to come out.
I ended up spending 3 days in the hospital and was only given one dose of antivenom but on a heavy pain killer drip in my IV for the entire time. I was on oxycontin for two days after gettting out of the hospital (they gave me a week worth of it, but it messed me up so much that I went on Tylenol instead as I'm not allowed to take ibuprofen or any other pain killer with a blood thinner). They also put my on an anti-biotic for a week and gave me some white cream called Silvadene, which was amazing at killing bacteria and helping the wound to hear quickly. My treatments have ended up being washing the wounded areas 2 - 3 times per day, squeezing the inflamed fluid out of the cuts from the doctor, adding more Silvadene creme, and then covering it with bandages.
The first week I ended up on my back most of the time with my arm elevated. I went back to work 7 days after, with my hand throbbing and my elbow and shoulder feeling inflamed and the entire arm/should sore. I started to turn the corner on my pain management and my ability to use my right hand (but still not my right thumb) around 2 weeks in.
The skin around where the toxin went end all ended up falling off. The thumbnail where I was bit is black and going to fall off now. it's now been 16 days and my thumb is still twice the size of what it was before and only has about 30% of the movement and 50% of the feeling back, and is still quite tender as though I jammed my finger. My forefinger is at about 85% movement and is swollen about 20% beyond normal.
I have great picture of me holding a beautiful copperhead snake but paid a terrible price for it. Moving forward I'll pass on picking up any more poisonous snakes.
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