Two Luling moms get sick from bug bites
Two Luling mothers have discovered just how dangerous insect bites can be, with one ending up in the hospital after a mosquito bite and the other dealing with a swollen face after a battle with a deer fly.
Teresa O’Neil was hanging out with friends in Kenner last Saturday when she was bitten by mosquitoes on both her arm and leg. A common occurrence in Louisiana, she didn’t think twice about the bites until her extremities started to swell up a day later.
“The bite on my arm was draining, but the one on my leg continued to swell even though I put alcohol on it. I had never seen a bite get that big before,” O’Neil said. “By Wednesday, my leg was huge, in constant pain and I was feeling light-headed.”
O’Neil visited her doctor that day and her leg was drained. She was told to come back in if the bite on her leg got any worse. By Friday, she had to return to the doctor and was told to head to the emergency room at Ochsner in Kenner.
“I was so out of it by then that I don’t remember much about going to the doctor or the emergency room,” O’Neil said. “My white blood count was soaring and my blood pressure was really low.”
Doctors told O’Neil that her bite had developed a staph infection and she was showing signs of sepsis, which is a severe illness where the bloodstream is overwhelmed by bacteria. She was put on a regimen of antibiotics and was administered fluids through an IV. She remained in the hospital for four days.
“It was a horrible experience,” O’Neil said. “I am just amazed at how quickly this progressed. If I had left this alone and hadn’t sought treatment, I would be dead.”
Even though she is out of the hospital, O’Neil still has a huge open sore on her leg and is unable to stand for long periods of time.
“I can stand up for about an hour and then I have to lay down and rest my leg,” she said. “Whenever I do stand it feels like a knife is digging into me.”
O’Neil said that doctors and friends are amazed that she developed staph from a mosquito bite.
“I keep having to tell everyone that it was definitely a mosquito bite because I slapped it and saw the blood on my hand,” O’Neil said. “It’s surprising, but staph is so common and you really need to go straight to the doctor at the first sign of an infection.
“That could be the difference between life or death.”
More than 30 different types of Staphylococci can infect humans, but most infections are caused by Staphylococcus aureus. Staphylococci can be found normally in the nose and on the skin. In the majority of cases, the bacteria do not cause disease. However, damage to the skin or other injury may allow the bacteria to overcome the natural protective mechanisms of the body, leading to infection.
Anyone can develop a staph infection.
O’Neil isn’t the only person to recently suffer the wrath of the Insect Kingdom.
Jacque DeLoach recently had her face swell up and render her unrecognizable after being bitten by a deer fly on her forehead, which caused an allergic reaction.
“I was just sitting outside at a crawfish boil when I felt the bite,” she said. “It started to swell up so quickly that by the time I reached up to scratch it my face was already puffing up.”
It took a week and a half before DeLoach said the swelling went down.
“It itched really bad during that time and when the swelling got so big I had a lot of pain in my face because of the pressure,” she said.
She did not seek medical treatment after the bite,
DeLoach said she has lived in Louisiana for her entire life and has been bitten by many different insects over the years. As she gets older, she says her allergic reaction towards the bites gets worse.
“I will not take anymore chances,” she said. “I’m heading straight to the doctor or ER if it happens again.”
Be the first to comment