A bite from the most venomous snake.

In this blog post I plan to outline in as much detail as possible the personal account of a bite from a captive Inland Taipan. I will detail the events and reactions.

I have been keeping and dealing with venomous snakes as pets for approx 15 years now, and back when I was a novice keeper I had two questions I had to ask myself.

1. Why do I want to keep venomous snakes?

2. What will I do if I get bitten?

The answer to question 1 is, and always has been an easy answer for myself. While others might find me a bit of an odd character or even crazy, I simply love, and find venomous snakes incredibly fascinating. My earliest memories are of venomous snakes at my parents house when I was 4 or 5 years old and they have been a constant curiosity for my entire life. It was inevitable, I would be a venomous snake weirdo!

So with question 1 being such an easy answer it makes question 2 that little bit harder to have a definitive answer for, especially up until this year I had been bite free!

Back when I first started keeping venomous snakes my answer was simply "I will deal with it if and when it happens" and continued on my way. 

Now that I have been bitten and envenomated by a venomous snake, I have had to make a few choices, as well as do some inner reflection......

On Sunday the 16th of January 2022 at approx. 15:35, I was feeding my captive bred Inland Taipan, which I have had for approx. 6 years (from birth). 

I was using long barbeque tongs to feed the snake. It missed its prey item, as I removed the prey item and moved my hand back, the snake continued out of its enclosure and struck me on the side, top and bottom of the right hand side of  my right hand. 

I have always kept pressure immobilisation bandages within my venomous snake room and within approx. 15 seconds I had started to apply a pressure immobilisation bandage to the bite site. 

I arrived at the Darwin Hospital emergency department at approx. 15:50, I waited in the emergency room for approx. 15 minutes before entering into the Emergency ward (EW).

On arrival to the emergency ward I  was connected to an electrocardiogram (ECG) machine, had my vitals checked and tested and remained on the hospital bed for approx. 1 hour. After the hour had past I had my bloods taken for testing as well as a urine sample given for testing as well.

The affects the venom has on the body can show up quite quickly in the blood and urine and is a fairly easy way to test to see if envenomation has occurred to the patient. 

Over the first 2 hours I felt fine, I was starting to think I may have received a dry bite (non envenomation). As it was approx. 17:00 I started to get hungry and was given food, water, and put on a I.V drip (cannula) for additional fluids.

After approx. 3 hours I started to get mild blurred vision and an increased heart rate, around 120 BBM. 

I started to get fairly sweaty, however my body temps remained steady at around 36 degrees Celsius. 

It was when my vision became blurred that I knew I had been envenomated, the facial muscles are among some of the first muscles to become paralysed from snake envenomation and the drooping of the eyes is known as ptosis.

It was around this time that the doctor had informed me of my blood test results, having mild muscle break down within the bloods, this is a sure sign that envenomation had occurred and the myotoxins within the Taipans venom were present.  

Myotoxins are small, basic peptides found in snake venoms (e.g. rattlesnakes) and lizard venoms (e.g. Mexican beaded lizard). This involves a non-enzymatic mechanism that leads to severe muscle necrosis. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Myotoxin#:~:text=Myotoxins%20are%20small%2C%20basic%20peptides,leads%20to%20severe%20muscle%20necrosis.)

After 4 hours of being in the emergency ward the doctor swabbed the bite site, to test for residual venom and to put through the venom detection kit, which than suggests the correct antivenom to use. It was around this time my eye sight deteriorated further and I really struggled to focus my eyes. I had to close one eye and use a single eye to maintain focus.

After the venom detection kit identified Taipan venom, I was given 12,000 units (I.V) of Taipan antivenom and monitored for 30 minutes, this included monitoring for signs of anaphylaxis from the serum and any other changes to health. After 30 minutes the pressure bandage was removed allowing any additional venom to travel into my system. 

At approx. 6 hours after admin to EW I was transferred to the Intensive Care Unit ((ICU).

For the rest of the night I was on the ECG, had my bloods taken every 3 hours and constantly woken up by nursing staff to check vitals, such as temperature and signs of paralysis. 

My blurred vision continued over the following days. 

On Monday 17th Jan 22 I managed to shower myself, eat and drink by myself and go to the toilet as normal.  The blurred vision was still around but less intense compared to the vision on the 4th hour post envenomation. There was pain around the bite site which radiated down to the knuckle on my pinkie finger and up to my wrist, as well as a numbness around the actual bite site (caused by nerve damage) and completely normal. I was taken off the ECG machine and transferred out of ICU and into the normal ward.

On Tuesday 18th Jan 22 I asked nursing staff to be discharged as I had very mild blurred vision but otherwise felt fine. I was discharged from hospital and returned home. 

On Wednesday 19th Jan 22 I had very foggy and slow thought processes, which I could nearly compare to feeling hung over. 

I had a lot of time just sitting around on hospital beds, and a lot of time to contemplate what I should do with regards to keeping venomous snakes. My Family had a fair input into my hobbies and suggested I get rid of them.

I decided that my bite was 100% the result of a long growing complacency that I have had with the husbandry requirements for venomous snakes, and a wake up call that I needed, but perhaps wish I didn't have. 

I have never been a "free handler" of venomous snakes, and I see those who free handle as an extreme complacency which could cause a needless bite,  and a possible machoism that they need to do, to prove how big their proverbial snake is.

Since being bitten I have changed my feeding routine, where as before I would feed the snakes within their enclosure, I now remove the snakes and feed them in feeding bins. This reduces feed responses from hungry snakes and will hopefully mean no  more bites!

As the reader there are a few points I would hope you take away from this article. 

1. venomous snake bite isn't instant death, if treated correctly you will literally have hours to seek help.

2. If you the reader are a venomous snake keeper, please be careful and consider your health and husbandry techniques.

3. Don't get bitten by venomous snakes!

Thanks for reading, Take care.