bite from a large animal.
iH: What did you do next?
KX: Well, luckily I had a friend over, which is unusual
because usually I am alone when I service the cages.
He is a reptile keeper but does not keep venomous
snakes. He was freaking out a bit, so I asked him if he
was OK to drive me to the hospital and he said he
was. Then, in retrospect, I made a mistake. Everyone
knows that when you get bitten by a venomous
snake you should take things slowly, but I started
walking around more than I should have. I shut up
the herp room, which is at the back of my property,
then went to the house and locked that up, and then
walked out the front to the car, rather than having it
driven closer.
‘I started walking around
more than I should have. I
shut up the herp room, then
went to the house, and then
walked out to the car.’
Day 5
Below: after blisters have been lanced off.
iH: Were you feeling any ill effects at this stage?
KX: No. The hospital was about half an hour away,
and halfway there I started to feel a little sick in the
stomach. Then about five minutes later I really felt
like I needed to vomit, so I asked my friend to pull
over. I started vomiting profusely - heaving. My
friend found a bag which he gave me and we kept
going. I kept vomiting for the rest of the drive, and
was starting to feel a bit hot and sweaty.
We got to the hospital about 10:00 p.m., and again
rather than wait and ask for a stretcher, I walked
inside. Although I felt sick, I wasn’t too bad. The
people in the emergency department asked for some
details, but I’m not sure how seriously they were
treating me to start with. Then I really needed to go
to the toilet, and when I got back to the waiting room
I started to vomit again. It was obvious that I needed
some help, and a nurse came out and grabbed me,
took me inside and asked me more questions about
what had happened. Then she said, “Are you
supposed to be walking around?” I told her that I
shouldn’t really be active, and ideally should be
immobilised. She went and found a mobile stretcher
and wheeled me to another part of the emergency
department.
Day 6
time with the Snake Venom Detection Kit (SVDK), but
they wanted to get some advice from a toxicologist.
They started doing some tests and monitoring vital
signs. I was hooked up to wires from my chest, a
Again, I was asked the circumstances of the bite. The
catheter was put in my arm and I was asked a few
doctors said it seemed like I knew what I was talking
more questions about how I was feeling. By this stage
about, so they would take my word for it and not waste my hand was starting to hurt as well, so they gave me