Doctor predicts it may take six months for full recovery from small nip



HERMISTON, Ore. - A small spider bite turned out to be a big problem for Cindy Pettey. Pettey awoke when she was bitten on the stomach in the middle of the night a few weeks ago, but thought little else of it. Then she started running a fever, she felt achy and weak. The bite sore became larger.

Next thing Pettey knew, a doctor was telling her he believed she'd been bitten by a dangerous hobo spider.

Pettey had surgery that removed 10 pounds of skin and flesh, leaving her with an abdomen covered in stitches.

Rob Hendrickson, a physician and director of the Oregon Poison Control Center, said the hobo is a non-aggressive spider that bites only when cornered. For example, when someone puts on a shoe with a spider inside.

The hobo is one of two dangerous spiders in Oregon. The other is the black widow. The brown recluse does not exist in Oregon, he said.

"In reality, most spiders are venomous, but aren't capable of penetrating human skin," Hendrickson said.

Hobo spider venom may cause necrosis, or death of the skin. When a spider injects venom below the skin, it reddens, swells, then turns black. But there is some doubt in the medical community about whether venom causes the skin death, Hendrickson said.

"If the venom can actually cause necrosis in humans," he said, "... then it is a very rare event."

Pettey isn't taking any more chances. She found five or six spiders that look like hobos. She also discovered two funnel webs like those made by hobo spiders. The webs, layered and non-sticky, funnel unwary prey toward a circular opening at the bottom of the web.

"I put hobo spider traps all over my house," she said.

Pettey's strength is returning slowly. She works five or six hours a day at her job at the Pilot Travel Center, then returns home exhausted. Her doctor told her it might be six months before she fully regains her energy.

"I come home and sleep for three hours," Pettey said. "It really zaps me."

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16160932/

maybe i shouldn't visit my family in portland for christmas after all

ouch

pictures!

Oh

my

GOD.


I am so glad that I was raised with arachnophobia in a country with relatively non-scary spiders

jerseykrs said:

that poor lady probably burned them all. imagine having to set traps for spiders

susannah said:

yup. that's what i'm talking about. the stuff of nightmares

Not hard to recognize one of those.

OH MY GOD! I cannot wait for sextonseven to see this!

XxAxX said:

MJ's spider bite.

Tsk tsk. What a shame. Spiders such as Charlotte make enormous strides in the arachnid campaign towards upgrading their public image, and some rotten spider like the one in that news article has to come along and set everything back 50 years! What a public relations nightmare!
[Edited 12/12/06 8:37am]

Oh my goodness! Thats disgusting
I fuckin hate spiders


Spiders

no, no, no.

she lost 10 pounds of flesh because I chopped bits of her off with an axe. the spider came later but i made her swear not to tell so she blamed the spider. genius!

Yay...there's no hobo spiders or brown recluses where I live

XxAxX said:

I've not played that before.

Cloudbuster said:

one of those traps might save yer life someday, matey

Cloudbuster said:

It's sort of like Ants in the Pants.

AsianBomb777 said:

EEEEEKKKKK!!!!!

WHY did I click on this thread???

http://www.usyd.edu.au/an...iders.html
these are the ones we have to put up with



these ones give those necrotic type bites too
http://www.abc.net.au/sci...050804.jpg

I usually find white-tail spiders in my bedroom - they like to get into clothes left on the floor.

TMPletz said:

yeah it even has spider in the title!

TMPletz said:

Maybe you need to lose 10 lbs. of belly?

ZombieKitten said:

Mama Get A Hammer (There's A Spider On Papa's Fly)

PANDURITO said:

!!!!!

maybe the critters are the "meek" that the bible speaks of inheriting the earth....

.....fuck I hate those creepy bastards.....!!

evenstar3 said:

Since discovering the org,
I've become a bit of a brown recluse myself.

TMPletz said:

because it's important to know what the risks are in life. some things they just don't teach you in school. like, one of life's risks is you could be putting a shoe on in oregon one morning and pow! a few weeks later your foot is gone.