Snakes galore

The last week was quite busy. We had about 20 patients brought in with snake bite. We lost Shivam couple of days back. By God's grace, only 8 of the 20 patients had evidence of envenomation. Interestingly, nine of the 20 patients brought the culprit snake, 7 of them dead snakes and two alive ! ! !. 

Here are the snaps of the snakes brought . . . I'm glad that none of the snakes were non-venomous . . .

This is a baby cobra which bit a 30 year old lady. Thankfully, there were no signs of envenomation. 

This is a krait which bit a lady who was sleeping on the floor. Again, there was no envenomation. 

This bit a 25 year old man on his toe. Again, no envenomation

I thought this was a wolf snake. This is live. The local experts say it is a krait. The 35 year old lady who was bitten by this snake had some sore throat and dizziness for about 12 hours which settled over time. There was no ptosis. We kept the patient on observation for 36 hours and discharged her. No ASV was given. 

A cobra who bit a prominent person of a village about 40 kilometers away. Mr. Phekku, 60 years old came in about 2 hours after the bite after the customary visit to the jhad phuk. He was on mechanical ventilation for about 2 days. He is doing fine now. We gave him the maximum possible dose of 20 vials ASV. Interestingly after we told the family that the culprit snake could be in the enclosed space where he was bitten, the family hired couple of snake charmers who caught the snake live and brought it to the hospital for identification. God only knows if this was the culprit snake or one which the snake charmers got out of their kitty and show cased it. 

Another krait. Again, the victim did not have features of envenomation. 

This snake bit a 40 year old lady from a nearby village. She was brought in almost 12 hours after the bite. She had ptosis and respiratory distress. She maintaind saturation without need of intubation. Her ptosis resolved after 10 vials of ASV.

A 3 feet long cobra which bit a 50 year old man inside his flour mill. It was wrapped around one of the machine parts which he was cleaning. He came in within 15 minutes. Initially, they did not know what snake it was. Later, when we told the relatives that considering that the bite happened in a room, the snake could still be lurking inside, the searched and found it out and killed it. Interestingly, within few minutes of the snake being brought in, the patient started developing ptosis and throat discomfort. He responded well to ASV and got discharged aftr 48 hours. He needed only 10 vials of ASV.  

Another krait brought in by a patient who was bitten on the leg. Again, no features of envenomation. 

It is quite interesting that only one patient out of the six who brought in the dead krait had features of envenomation whereas two out of the three patients who brought a cobra had features of envenomation. Please note that there were 11 other patients who came with bites from unidentified snakes. 5 of them had features of envenomation and we had to give ASV. 

And, we finished about 100 vials of ASV in 3-4 days, including 50 on a single day . . . 

More, in the next posts . . .