Looks Like A Spider Bite To Me.................

[crotchitymedic1986]

Not so fast, that wound may be MRSA instead, especially if the patient doesnt remember actually being bitten. You see this more in the ER than in the field, but often times patients present with a wound that looks like a spider bite, but they do not remember getting bit. One study showed that over 70% of "spider bite" wounds cultured out as MRSA instead.

http://www.aafp.org/fpr/20041100/10.html

http://www.surviveoutdoors.com/emergency/mrsa.asp (this link contains a pic)

http://ochealthinfo.com/epi/mrsa/providers.htm

[Kaisu]

had one last week.... patient claimed spider bite - huge honkin' abscess - good post. I personally assume they all are MRSA positive.

[ERDoc]

This is a huge pet peeve of mine. People where I am are obsessed with spider bites. Unfortunetly we have a large MRSA population so everyone shares war stories about the spider that bit them, though none of them actually saw it. I did have one legitimate spider bite though. Kid came in saying he was bitten by a black widow. :roll: Sure enough, he had the spider in a jar, two of them actually. :shock: He was displaying all of the typical signs and symptoms. He was admitted to the hospital for a week for pain control. He was helping his grandfather install a washer that had been shipped from Arizona and the spiders were in the box.

[akflightmedic]

Great thread!

What do you think Dwayne? Maybe I had MRSA???

As some of you saw in chat, about 2 months ago I had a nasty "spider bite"...LOL. Actually, we were not sure what it was and the docs over here had all kinds of theories. We were unable to culture it, so we will never know.

However I have a nice crater and scar on my face now as a result of it. It presented like a spider bite, swelled up, turned black, looked necrotic and the skin started to slough.

It took 14 days of IV antibiotics 2 x a day followed by 10 days of oral antibiotics to resolve it.

I have pics of the different stages if anyone is interested. People in chat got to see it live!!! LOL.

[crotchitymedic1986]

The good news is that the treatment for both is essentially the same, antibiotics. This is why so many were assumed to be spider bites, because the wound healed, and there was no culture of the wound. Since it healed with first round antibiotics, there was no follow-up. But as we are aware, we have many superbugs that are becoming more and more resistant to antibiotics, which led to more cultures being performed, and the discovery that many spider bites are not spider bites at all. Most the people that I triaged in the ER DID NOT remember a spider bite, they assumed that it occured in their sleep.

Obviously, the concern for you is PPE, and proper clean up (dont taste the spider bite).

[Chief1C]

I have terrible reactions to spider bites, worse than wasp stings. I hate doctors, on a personal level. No offense. Went to mine for some steroids, and benadryl IM. Doc's an asshole, speaks broken English, can't understand what the hell he's saying. My beef is he's a new age, natural guy, who doesn't believe in pain management.. and I've got five bad discs. Anyhoo. My leg around this one bite in particular was badly swollen. I had prednisone.. But needed something that would work a little faster. Seemed to work. Thought it was better, but then the bite got all purple, a welt the size of my fist, no granulation area, just the two little bite marks. Got really hot, the skin was tight, hurt like a bastard when ever I moved. So, I did what any you tuber would do. I stabbed it with a surgical blade. Nasty yellow stuff, dark yellow, ended up with a hole about a half inch deep. Tried to care for it on my own, w/ Cipro left over from something a year earlier..

That's when it got complicated. In the course of maybe eight hours, I went from just pain at the bite, to the whole calf of my leg being red and hot. Fever up to 104, terrible abdominal pain. Apparently that was from the cipro. I got really, really sick. That cleared up with some IV antibiotics, and some nasty tasting liquid antibiotics. I swear, it tasted like the smell of sewage. They swabbed the 'hole' and it ended up being staph, took over five months to heal. Packed it w/ betadine soaked gauze twice a day. Didn't seem to do anything but make my hands shake and cause excruciating pain. Finally I gave in and went to a wound clinic, they gave me two tubes of Mupirocin ointment.. and Before I even finished with one tube, it was healed pretty well. I hope anyway, b/c I'm not going back to pay $290 for some technician to say it looks better.

[Arizonaffcep]

This is a huge pet peeve of mine. People where I am are obsessed with spider bites. Unfortunetly we have a large MRSA population so everyone shares war stories about the spider that bit them, though none of them actually saw it. I did have one legitimate spider bite though. Kid came in saying he was bitten by a black widow. :roll: Sure enough, he had the spider in a jar, two of them actually. :shock: He was displaying all of the typical signs and symptoms. He was admitted to the hospital for a week for pain control. He was helping his grandfather install a washer that had been shipped from Arizona and the spiders were in the box.

Oh sure...blame the sun worshipers...

[ccmedoc]

MRSA spiders are invading the cities up here :shock: ....We see dozens of people bit by these little critters on a monthly basis.

[Arizonaffcep]

Sounds like a fair trade, we send you guys our MRSA spiders, and you send us TB patients...

[spenac]

Good post ditch doctor I mean crotch.