Venomous snake brought into hospital in lunchbox prompts plea from doctors — 'please don't do this'
www.abc.net.au
Hospital staff came face-to-face with one of the world's most deadly snakes after a patient brought it to the emergency department in a snap-lock lunch container.
  • halcyoncmdr@lemmy.worldEnglish
    361·
    7 months ago

    Isn’t antivenin very species-specific? How are they supposed to know the snake off a probably shitty description from the person bitten, if they even saw it? And saying to not even take a photo? What?

    • Jay@lemmy.caEnglish
      62·
      7 months ago

      Further in the article.

      Dr Michael said medical staff did not need to see a snake to know how to treat patients.

      “We can determine if you need anti-venom and if so, what anti venom you need based on clinical signs, blood tests and also the snake venom detection kits that we keep here at the hospital,” he said.

      "We’re actually not trained to identify snakes, and so it’s not helpful. “It just puts the staff at risk as well as yourself.”

      • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.worldEnglish
        18·
        7 months ago

        Incorrect. They have a test to conclusively determine what antivenom will work on it, if it even needs any. Bringing them the snake, or even a picture of the snake doesn’t help, they can’t identify the snake on sight any more than you can.

        Bringing the snake just puts more people at risk and slows everything down as they have to now deal with there being a snake at the hospital. Putting you at more risk of delays. Delays are what you want to avoid in snake bite care. The delay of going and getting the snake, or a picture of the snake, the delay of there being a snake at the hospital. The delay of arguing with the emotional person that wants them to examine the snake rather than running the faster and more accurate test they would have to run anyway rather than guessing what snake it is by looking at it…

          • Tarquinn2049@lemmy.worldEnglish
            1·
            7 months ago

            It sounds like it hasn’t been a big enough problem yet, but they just want to head it off. And it may have been more helpful in the past. I don’t know how long the antivenom test has been faster and more accurate than physically identifying the snake. Either way, bringing the snake now is overall a much worse idea than it probably used to be.

        • Case@lemmynsfw.comEnglish
          1·
          7 months ago

          A friend of the family raised rattlers to milk for their venom.

          Even knowing exactly what was being dealt with, he still gave up after losing two fingers.

          Rural, of course, so there were delays.