Snake Bite Prompts Push For Education

[CharlieJ]

Snake Bite Prompts Push For Education
Heidi Toth - Daily Herald

Seven-year-old Rachel Isaacson wants to be a dancer.

That made the rattlesnake bite to the foot she suffered a week ago and the harrowing few hours following it that much more difficult. But it also made her surprisingly quick recovery an even bigger miracle for the American Fork family.

Dennis Isaacson had stopped at the Jordanelle Reservoir overlook on the evening of July 2 to let his family enjoy the view. The turnout was formed with concrete barriers lined on one side with asphalt and the other side with gravel. Channels about 2 inches high were cut through the barriers.

"What had happened was the road base on our side had blocked off that channel, and it was open on one side and closed off on the other," he said, calling the holes a perfect man-made rattlesnake den. Rachel, his youngest daughter, was walking around.

It was then that the snake lashed out, biting her foot.

"We heard no sound, we didn't see the rattlesnake, it didn't rattle, there was nothing slithering away," Isaacson said.

The bite was only with one fang, so none of them recognized it immediately. They returned to American Fork and took Rachel, whose foot and ankle were swelling, to the emergency room.

After a short wait, a call to Poison Control and a blood test to confirm she had been bitten, doctors injected four vials of antivenin into Rachel's bloodstream and continued to observe her. The swelling continued up toward the knee throughout the next day, so two more vials were injected.

A week later, the swelling is gone and the dancer hopeful is back to full activity, one of the thousands of Americans each year who gets bitten, gets the right treatment and recovers normally. Snake bites can be both debilitating and deadly, though, if the right care isn't taken. The first step is awareness of what one is dealing with, something the Isaacsons ran into repeatedly.

First, Dennis Isaacson said, he should have recognized it as a bite and taken Rachel to the hospital in Heber City. The second was the hospital staff not recognizing the swelling and wound as a snake bite and then putting ice on the foot. He emphasized that he didn't want to blame anyone, instead advocating for more information on the subject.

"Everybody was doing everything the best they could by the knowledge they had," he said.

Hospital spokeswoman Janet Frank said the treating physician did everything they were supposed to, including calling Poison Control and Primary Children's Medical Center in Salt Lake. Although snake bites are rare -- Rachel was the second at American Fork Hospital in the past year out of more than 13,000 patients -- the hospital staff was prepared for it and handled it properly.

"That's actually our standard of care," she said. "It was really the physician being responsible and making sure he had the most reliable information."

Throughout the 16-minute wait before being seen and as tests were being done, the hospital staff was watching Rachel to ensure her symptoms were not progressing, Frank said.

Utah Valley Regional Medical Center also has had two in the past year, while both Mountain View Hospital in Payson and Timpanogos Regional Hospital in Orem have not seen any this year, although both average one to two instances. According to the Utah Poison Control Center, nine bites have been reported in 2006.

Scott Root, conservation outreach manager for the state's Division of Wildlife Resources, said people who are out in the wilderness tend to run across the reptiles occasionally. If it happens, he said, leave it alone.

Rattlesnake bites are fairly rare, he said, helped by the warning system they have built in, although he cautioned that people in rattlesnake country shouldn't depend on hearing the rattle to know a snake is there.

"You just have to use caution," he said. "Keep your eyes open."

Rattlesnake country includes the desert and the mountains throughout Utah; the snakes live all throughout the mountains surrounding Utah County, Root said.

"They're up there, but we don't want people not to go up to the mountains because they're afraid of rattlesnakes," he said.

For people living in or near the foothills close to the mountains, finding a snake in one's garden, yard or windowsill also isn't out of the realm of possibility, but it is unlikely. If that happens, he said, call the division; he said he doesn't want people to start trying to remove the venomous reptiles by themselves.

People also should know that young rattlesnakes are just as venomous.

"Even though they're cute, leave them alone," Root said.

The venom from rattlesnakes' fangs help to immobilize the prey and start the predigestion process by destroying tissue and blood cells. The antivenin can be injected for the next few hours after the bite and should neutralize the venom, although since it's made of horse blood serum it can cause severe allergic reactions.

Dos and Dont's of rattlesnakes

Do:
Remain alert when hiking or in the outdoors.
Wear boots and watch where you stick your hands and feet.
Keep your distance if you see or hear a snake.
Alert the authorities if the snake presents a significant danger.
Get medical care immediately if you or someone else has been bitten.
Try to keep the victim calm and heart rate down.

Don't
Pick up or harass a snake.
Try to suck the venom out of a bite.
Ice the bitten area or tourniquet it.
Avoid all nature just for the sake of avoiding rattlesnakes.