While taking my girlfriend shooting last Thursday I dropped some shells on the ground and when I went to pick them up, I was bitten by a baby copperhead on my finger. I now have a lunch lady arm. 4 bags of antivenom and 4 days in the hospital. Watch out when you are in the woods guys. I was looking and never saw it.

Damn. That sucks! Hope you get better soon....

Don't you have a out of pocket maximum?

Im at the beach in North Carolina and found a baby copperhead on the road in front of the house. Laid out in the middle of the road we were walking down....

Just curious what actions you took when you got bit? And how long between the bite and the hospital.


Btw your Pics aren't loading.

Pics ?  Now you have a cool story. Not to mention an excuse for tactical operator gloves

That sucks, sorry to hear that you got bit. Crofab is expensive and sucks for the pharmacy to make. I hope you have good insurance. You probably got about 10 to 12 vials of Crofab that could cost -$30,000+. The last time I checked our cost at the hospital was around $2,500 a vial from what I remember. Made some for a guy that got bit by a copperhead about a month ago.

I helped tend to a guy with a timber rattler bite in North Carolina over the 4th weekend until EMS arrived.  He was near unconscious and mostly incoherent when he arrived at the ranger station where we were stopped.  It had been 45+ minutes since the bite.

I don't envy you or him the hospital bills.  Hope you have a speedy recovery, OP.

How did you " tend" to him ? When the pros arrived, what did they do differently?

Trying to learn here

$5 says he sucked the venom out and spit it on the floor. That's how they do it in the movies.

ya have to cut an "X" across the bite, first

Good luck with a no complications recovery, and hope insurance covers most if not all of the cost.

I've only had one friend bitten that needed antivenom, but that was long ago with the old antivenom that was cheap so his overnight stay at the hospital cost more than the antivenom.

My previous dog was bitten once, but he just had red streaks running down his leg for 2 days without issue.  I don't think much venom got injected, so no vet visit was required.  I did get rid of the offending copperhead though.

LOL at the other replies.

We were just about to leave the ranger station and go riding (one of our group had just gotten back from pulling a stuck vehicle out of a ditch somewhere), when this guy comes flying into the parking lot honking the horn with lights flashing.  We saw him jump out and he was running around his truck very animated and talking & gesturing to everyone out front.  We swung back around and saw he had someone in the passenger seat essentially lying down.

I got out and went to see what was going on and learned his friend had been bitten roughly 45 minutes to an hour previously.  He (driver) had carried him at least part of the way back to his truck as they'd been ~2 miles off the road.  No one seemed to have any idea what to do and the rangers had spoken to him and then gone back inside (to call 911 I guess) and weren't offering any help.

The victim was near unconscious, and his breathing was quicker than normal and shallow.  I asked the driver to pull into the shade so we could cool him down (he was warm to the touch).  Once there, I looked him over (just assessing his status, really) and tried to get him to respond to me.  He answered to his name, but otherwise didn't respond well to verbal questions.  He started to gag and had evidently already thrown up once so we pulled him from the car and I had the driver lay him down in the shade on his side.  The rangers brought some rags, water and ice so we put a cool cloth on the victims head (neck) and I rolled some iced up into the victims shirt back and rubbed it over his back to try and bring his core temps down a little.

I checked the bite location - it wasn't swollen and purple like I'd expected - and took the victims heart and respiration rates.  Otherwise I just monitored his breathing and kept talking to him to monitor his lucidity until the EMTs arrived, at which point I gave them what little vitals I had.


So really not a lot I could do and at that point, not a lot to do, other than keep him cool, calm and conscious, and prevent any choking from vomit.

You did about all you could or should do given that help was on its way, good on you. Only other things to remember is to try and keep the bite site below heart level and clean it if possible. Do not give the victim any alcohol or caffeinated drinks and do not try to suck out the venom, you could add another victim to the list if you try that Hollywood stuff.

I got bit when I was reaching to pick up some bullets that fell on the ground. I was in Dahlonega near the national forest. My girlfriend squeezed it when it happened and some venom came out. It hit my in the index finder right on the knuckle. We got in my truck drove to the fires station and they got us quickly to Gainesville. Within an hour of being bitten I had the anti venom in me. My whole arm was swollen and looked like it didn't belong on my body.

Thanks - I did make sure we kept the legs down (someone erroneously said to raise them above the heart).  The bite location was not easily discerned and I chose not to attempt to do anything with it.  Interestingly someone stopped by to check on him who claimed to be a doctor, but didn't stick around and didn't do anything other than ask about his condition.

You doing better? The lunch lady arm comment in your original post made me laugh.

Too cool someone down I've always been taught to put ice bottles, if you have them, under the arms and in between the legs. Since the arteries are there it's supposed to cool someone quickly. No ice bottles then cold water soaking that area.

They teach us that at work. I'm not outside but most of the company is and we have to go through the sane training. I'm sure someone with more experience can comment about the validity of this, but it seems logical.

Any pics?

Any update on issuance and anti venom? This thread has be concerned now...n

That makes sense.  He wasn't over 100 (after having kids, I can read temperature off the head, neck and torso to within a half degree about 95% of the time) so I wasn't trying to cool him down as much as keep him comfortable and cool because it was hot out.


OP, would you update the thread and let us know if there are any lingering effects from time to time?

Remember also that except for coral snakes, all native venomous species in the US are crotalids, and as such, have a primarily hemotoxic venom. Their venom causes internal bleeding, prevents clotting, and just generally F's up your insides. That's why you see the kind of tissue damage and swelling that they cause.

However, if you were to use a constricting band of any type on the affected limb, you would be localizing the venom and greatly increasing the damage to the affected area. You would probably not prevent any systemic problems, but would probably cause the loss of that limb. Barring extremely long evac times, I would not perform such a maneuver. Even then, I'd only consider it in extreme circumstances, like an already ill patient, or someone with a history of bleeding disorder or clotting factor issues.

Where constricting bands may prove useful is for elapids. Coral snakes, cobras, taipans, etc. are elapids. Their venoms are primarily neurotoxins and other toxins that cause major CNS and cardiac issues. Keeping that mess in a limb may cause more damage to that limb, but because of the action of the toxin, the goal is to prevent full systemic distribution. Losing an arm or leg is preferable to respiratory arrest or cardiac disrhythmias. A really tight, wide ACE bandage wrap, or a wide tourniquet would work.

In all cases, keeping the patient chilled out is a priority. Some of that is psychological treatment. Some is physical.

Thanks for the info.

Given your line of work, any other recommendations? Venomous snakes scared the bejesus out of me. I take my boys (5,7) out camping, hiking, hunting, fishing constantly. Then getting bit by a snake is one of my biggest fears.  I have one of those snake bite kits, and I've read the directions. But I've always wondered on the effectiveness

Same here

They are bad in GA this yr. mainly because folks are killing the ones that kill them,  :(    I had 2 babies curled up under a tarp by our pool. While killing one, they other was steady striking the shovel....Still want to find mama....

Found crawling across my drive the other day, when coming back from a walk with my 8 year old.  We gave him a wide berth.

My driveway is about 1/4 mile long, and he was no where near the house.I'd imagine there are a lot more that crawl across that we never know about.  In fact, this is the only copperhead I've seen in 9 years at this house.  I always give the kings and rat snakes I see a pass too...maybe that explains the relatively small number of copperheads I have seen.

Too soon to call dibbs on guns & ammo?




Seriously OP hope you're recovery is going well.

7mm

In the field, primary treatment is mainly keeping the patient calm and initiating transport to definitive care as soon as possible. By definitive, I mean a hospital that has antivenin on hand. If you're in the boonies, that may mean you pass a podunk hospital like Morgan Memorial to go somewhere better, like Athens Regional. Or you bring in a helicopter if the patient condition dictates.

Sawyer Extractors have never been proven to be effective. They may actually cause more damage just through the mechanical vacuum and what it does to capillaries and other small vessels. The argument has been made that it may provide psychological relief, in the form of a kind of placebo effect, because the patient thinks you're doing something beneficial. I would argue that if THAT is what gets your patient to chill the F out, either you suck at talking to people, or your patient is an idiot.

Work well for popping zits

HEY NOW!!!

Don't you dare refer to our Band Aid station, here in Madison, as a "pudunk hospital"!!!!

You'll give them the big head, and they'll run their rates from skyhigh, to astronomical, if they think they can con us into believing they are any kind of "actual hospital", regardless of how far down the totem pole they rate.....

St. Mary's in Athens for the M***** F****** WIN!!!!!!

Shoot, I'd go for Good Samaritan before Morgan. Somehow, Morgan is a trauma center.

Only in their favorite dreams, and my worst nightmares!!!

If you need more than 6 stitches to cure what ails you, you are taking your life (and your pocketbook) into your hands, if you choose to let Morgan Memorial, in Madison, GA, take a shot at working on you. A very good friend of mine worked as a nurse in the ER there a number of years ago, and one of the ER dr.'s was under investigation, at the time, for showing up to work drunk. Never heard the outcome, but as far as I know he's still a dr. in these parts. And yes, the nurse said that he often showed up for work in the evenings, after partaking of a few.....

I'll gladly drive the extra 45 minutes to get to St. Mary's in Athens, TYVM!!!!

Oh, I'm very clear. I've been taking people in and out of there for most of my career.

St. Mary's has the best EMS room in the business.

I'm sure you've seen multitudes more than I, but most people don't handle stressful situations well. Logical thinking is typically the last thing most do. I could see placebos doing very well in those situations.

In north Georgia is there a list of which hospitals stock anti venom?

The hospitals that treat EMS well, generally treat their patients the same. I've found that to hold true throughout the southeast.