Sometimes things are not what they seem. A visitor posted that a comment that he thought his wife was bitten by brown recluse which looked just like a bite, but instead it turned out to be a MRSA Staph Infection.
Here is information on this infection that can mimic a spider bite. Want to see what can happen when a bite gets infected? Then check out our section on Staph Infection.
Here are the most common symptoms of a staph infection, courtesy of the U.S. National Library of Medicine:
- A swollen, red, and sore area on the skin that may drain pus or other fluid.
- A warm feeling around the infected area.
- Fever, chills, headache, and muscle aches.
- Pain in the chest.
- Fatigue.
- General feeling of sickness.
If you have these symptoms, see your doctor immediately.
So, what is Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus and what does MRSA look like?
Staphylococcus aureus (staph) is a common type of bacteria (germ) that is often found on the skin and in the nose of healthy people. It can also grow in wounds or other sites in the body, sometimes causing an infection. For example, staph is one of the most common causes of skin infections.
Penicillin is a drug that was once commonly used to treat staph infections. However, over time many staph bacteria have become difficult to treat with penicillin and antibiotics related to penicillin. These new or resistant forms of Staphylococcus aureus are called methicillin resistant staphylococcus aureus, or MRSA. The illnesses they cause are the same as those caused by other staph the difference is in how they are treated.
MRSA looks like a normal staph bacteria in the early stages and normally does not cause disease unless it enters an opening in the skin. However, some people are at higher risk for carrying MRSA or becoming infected with this type of staph.
MRSA more often occurs in people in hospitals and healthcare facilities. It can also occur outside the hospital in people who receive multiple antibiotics, as well as in people who have close contact with a person carrying the germ or by touching objects contaminated with MRSA (e.g., clothes, towels, bedding, athletic equipment, benches in saunas or hot tubs, bandages).
Staph bacteria (including MRSA) are most often spread by close contact with infected people or the things they touch. It is not spread through the air.
Many people carry staph bacteria on their skin without any symptoms. Symptoms of a MRSA or other staph infection depends upon where the infection is located. Infections of the skin are the most common, and cause symptoms such as redness, warmth, pus and a wound that does not heal.
Your doctor may refer to these infections as boils, furuncles, impetigo, or abscesses. Infections can also develop in the blood, bone, bladder, lungs, and other sites. Symptoms there will depend on the site of infection, but include fever and pain at the site.
What should I do if I think I have a MRSA or other staph infection? See your healthcare provider. It can be very difficult to tell what MRSA looks like and tests are your best way to determine if you have a problem and need treatment, but don’t wait!
MRSA and other staph infections are treatable! Some staph skin infections can be treated simply by draining the sore and keeping the wound clean. For more serious infections, antibiotics can be used to treat these infections. If antibiotics are prescribed by your healthcare provider, it is very important to finish taking all the pills and to call your doctor if the infection does not get better.
What can you do to prevent MRSA and other staph infections?
- Wash your hands often, especially when you’re exposed to someone with an infection or when you touch objects that may be contaminated.
- Keep cuts and scrapes clean and covered.
- Avoid sharing personal items such as towels, sports equipment, razors, etc.
- If a sore or cut becomes red, oozes, causes pain or isn’t healing, see a doctor.
- Don’t insist on antibiotics for colds or other viruses.
- If prescribed antibiotics, take all the pills, even if you feel better before they are all gone.
I, also have had MRSA…. I had back surgery in May of 2011….came home from the hospital….three weeks later a health care worker who was at my home asked to look at my back….she discovered I had a sore where the surgery site was…it also was draining. I saw some drainage on my panties and gowns several days before; but I thought it was just healing from the back surgery site. I had to go to the hospital and they drew tons of fluid from the wound. The day after that the nerurosurgeon had to take me back into surgery to take care of the problem….because I had MRSA. I spent five days in the hospital, and went home with a PICC line. Also, I had to have a wound vac to drain from my surgery site. Nurses had to come to my home each day, and every week they had to draw blood to send to the infectious control doctor. This went on for weeks; but finally I was off of the PICC line and other meds. I do not know if MRSA affected my recovery; but here it is almost ayear later and I have some much pain in my legs I can not stand up or sit down or walk without terrible pain. I had to leave my job at a hospital after 24years, and get disability.
A Hope, can u give me the dosages you took? You cam email me at billyp514 (at) yahoo.com. My husband got it while in the hospital years ago & I got it from him. Several months ago it came back in both of us & our 2 year old. I think I have it again. I am so frustrated that it keeps coming back. Thanks to anyone who can give me any all natural treatment suggestions.
I’ve had MRSA problem several times in my life and I’m under 30. I’m sharing this because I’m appalled by the people who are not taking it seriously, cutting the lumps/infections out of themselves, ignoring the problem or trying to save money and treat it with weird home remedies.
My left thigh had to have 3 big surgeries to cut out the infection. The doctor literally cut a hole in my leg and took out bad tissue. Its sounds gross and medieval but they saved my life and my leg in doing so. All this was due to MRSA.
Basically my leg would get sore, red and id go to the hospital within like 48 hours I develop 105 fevers, they do surgery, remove tissue and about 2 months later the hole in my leg would close and id be good as new. Three or two years later it would happen all over again. I didn’t have a bug bite, or an ingrown hair, or pimples, or a rash or any of that stuff.
My advice to u is once u have a MRSA infection on your stomach or leg be careful it’ll come back it always does. Look for unexplainable soreness, redness, fever, a boil/pimple forms in the area, it smells bad, it has pus. Go to a hospital where they have a wound care facility and understand MRSA, staph, abscess, cellulitus etc.
Best of luck to you all.
I developed an open wound on my lower abdomen about a month and a half ago. I finally went to the doctor last week because it wasn’t getting better and I was starting to feel shaky, hot/cold, sick to my stomach. This wound oozes pus non stop. I went to an urgent care and he said it wasn’t a spider bite so he said it must be a staph infection. I went to another doctor the next day and he also said staph.
Sunday night it started bleeding and I knew something wasn’t right. Went back to the doctor and was told it was not staph. Sent to an infectious disease doctor who agreed it wasn’t staph and he sent me to a dermatologist for a biopsy. They are testing me for lupus (I have had lupus type symptoms for years but never had lupus).
My question is if it’s not staph, not MRSA, not a spider bite, what the heck is it. No one seems to know. I woke up one morning with a huge red oval on my stomach which started to shrink and once it started shrinking the skin came off and it’s been this way ever since. Has any one experienced anything like this?
To A Hope:
I am going to the dermatologist today for confirmation about a staph infection I am sure I have (I have all the symptoms – red, oozes, warm to touch) possibly MRSA because I have been on antibiotics for a week now and it has only proceeded to get worse. I do want to try the natural medications that you mentioned within your posts. If you could provide more specifics to me I would greatly appreciate it. You may email me at kstarr [at] mines.edu, or for others, it may be useful if you post the regiment here. Thanks Again!
Ok, read down the page and you will see I left natural medicine instructions for anyone who has MRSA. I have taken this medicine and so has my teenage daughter. Neither of us has any symptoms at all anymore. I did up my dosage after i got the symptoms under control. I doubled everything for 3 days. Took one pill away from each type of med and each dose the next two days, went to normal dosage the next 2 days and went off all meds for two more days.
I did this to teach my system to fight the MRSA and it worked. I am no longer sick and I can even shave my underarms again. If you need specifics let me know and I will write each type of natural medicine down with each dose and how many days. You can fight this and WIN!
I was diagnosed with MRSA 08/2011, with a large MRSA wound, after what everyone thought was a spider bite on the same leg coincidentally I had just had a knee replacement on just a couple months prior to the wound appearing. I was extremely ill from the time I had the knee replacement with actually coming home from the hospital with a shingles outbreak on my face. Maybe MRSA? I will never know.
I then battled a very itchy rash on my leg and then finally the huge MRSA wound on my upper thigh. During all of this time I was given huge doses of antibiotics but without any relief. I then developed shortness of breath extreme fatigue, depression and really began to think my time on this earth was limited at best.
I was finally admitted to the hospital in kidney failure and very low white blood cell count. Saw several specialists while in the hospital for 7 days and was given a shot of neupogen in my stomach to raise my white blood cell count. It was decided that I had a severe reaction to Bactrim and it was discontinued.
That was in August of 2011 and January 2012 I am still battling extreme fatigue and joint pain among other symptoms. I just saw an endocrinologist and we have now discovered I have Hashimoto’s Disease which is an auto-immune disease. The Dr believes that I have acquired this disease due to how extremely sick I was last year. My system is now attacking my own thyroid and now we are having to adjust medications to hopefully get me back on track.
All of this because of MRSA.
Everyone please watch the signs and do not take the medical personnel dismissing what could be a very serious medical situation.
Wishing everyone good health and speedy recoveries.
I live in Florida all there is, is woods around. one morning I woke up to red spots on me so I watched them for a couple of days and they got bigger went to doctor and he said it was cellulite. well it got worse it was MRSA and now I have it again, my husband has it in his nose. we have purple spots on us from the MRSA now, does anyone have them too.
I live out in the “boonies” here in Florida. On Christmas Eve (night time) I went out to get the mail. I felt something hot hit me on my left calf. I went inside, and within an hour started vomiting and had diarrhea. I thought I had just had too much fast food. On Sunday after Christmas dinner and all had left, I ran a hot bath, sat and soaked in it for maybe 15 minutes. I thought I had sciatica cause I hurt all over, no fever, no chills.
When I looked down at the leg that had felt hot on Christmas Eve I saw some bright green puss coming out of a small pimple. Also what looked like a straw or stinger with an empty bag on it. Like a bee stinger or a snake bite. It looked mostly like a snake bite on my leg. I put it on wax paper and stapled it shut. Went to bed and by 7:00 am it was swollen and hot. I had a dark almost black spot the size of a dime where the thing had pushed out. Dressed and drove immediately to the emergency room at local hospital.
I gave the doctor the wax paper with what appeared be a stinger or fang. He said “what the h…. is this?” I told him it came out of my leg. Anyway he looked at the exzemia I had on the back of my leg and told me I had cellulitis infection. Not a snake bite. Gave me antibiotic prescription and a shot of a broad spectrum antibiotic. Sent me home. Used warm packs on it as instructed and did not cover it.
The doctor totally dismissed the snake bite theory. I did not see the snake, but the symptoms were the same as snake bite. That was on Monday morning. By Wednesday morning I was in big time pain and the spot on my leg had seeped watery blood, and huge amounts of yellow puss. I covered it and headed back to ER. By the time I got there it had grown in size and had two large abscesses draining on to the floor from under the bandage and when they pulled off the bandage it had long strings of something like puss coming out of it. Smelled really bad.
They cleaned the wound, packed it with medicine, and started me on another antibiotic, took a culture of it. Sent home. Went back Friday to have packing taken out. Culture said MRSA. I am on heavy duty antibiotics. Thankfully I have not had to be hospitalized. If you get MRSA I will tell you it is very painful. I still think I was bitten by a snake since I live out in the woods. No other homes for several miles. The nausea and vomiting and bowels problem with in that short amount of time is classic symptoms. The doctors told me if it really was a snake bite that the snake had MRSA bacteria in the fangs! Still though they dismissed the whole idea.
Thanks so much for reading this. Rene
Hi,
I had a bad case of the MRSA in the nose and which was highly resistant for any treatment finally we have a solution for this one” a ointment called as T bact which contains mupirocin ointment when applied on the infected area for 3 to 4 days , seems that 100% cure and no more infection reoccurring for ever !!!!!
Arun kumar
Just learned today I have MRSA, I have a abscess on my stomach, the lump is about the size of a half dollar and it had a tiny hole at the top, the doctor opened up the hole so he can pack the wound, I’m currently on bactrium antibiotic, and today i am also starting to take probiotics, (you can take probiotics 3 hours before or after you take antibiotic), I’m hoping the probiotics will restore the good bacteria getting killed by the bactrium and boost my immune system, i believe i got my MRSA from a co worker which sucks because i wash my hands like crazy, don’t know how it ended up on my stomach but who knows, i originally thought it was a spider bite. I’m researching like crazy for ways to prevent another infection in the future, i will keep checking back to this site to read the updates from you guys, maybe we can come up with something to beat this thing.
OK, so I woke up one morning with what I thought was a bug or spider bite. Not a big deal right? Well, 2 days later it was still there it itched a lot, had a big red ring around it and a weird looking black scab in the middle and it would not pop. The bump was really hard so I went to the medical facility on our army post (We only have one real doc and she is a pediatric doc) and she said it was a spider bite and gave me cephalexin (keflex), the next day it was worse and was turning a bit purple and the red ring spread further on my arm and was really hot.
I went back to see her and she had another doc on call come look at it and he said the antibiotics should kick in about 48 hours later and it had only been 24. So I waited another day. Again, the redness spread, the knot was bigger and it was still hot and itchy. I went back and they still did not run any tests, told me it would heal up and I told them they could cut it out because I wanted it gone. They did take a needle and open the top up and then squeezed all the puss out. Keep in mind it was a hard knot so this stuff was not easy to get out and it hurt like hell but i suffered through it and they finally said they had it all. The doc left and while i was waiting for the nurse to come back in and clean and wrap it up the redness had spread more and it was on fire and the knot was back but I requested the doc to come back and look at it again and they told once again it was normal…
I’m not a doctor but this is crazy…. well all of that happened yesterday and I am still taking my meds, I woke up this morning with a new itchy bump on my shoulder so I am freaking out it may be the same thing and my son has to things that look like bites on both his wrists and I cant have him going through what i am so everything is freaking me out because I believe it is mrsa and it is still draining today and totally disgusting I want to add…. I don’t know if it is a spider bite or mrsa but I do know that it is gross, hurts, red, hot, swollen, itchy, and started off looking like a little pimple.
OIL of OREGANO folks!!
I am not sure what I have just yet. I have had multiple abcecces on my body. I thought it was just a spider bite the first time. The infection swelled and made about an inch circle of my skin real tight. At first I thought it was either a pimple or in grown hair so I attempted to squeeze the puss out of it. but by the third day it hurt worse than ever and no puss was really coming out.
At that point I decided to leave it alone, just clean it with hydrogen peroxide and then cover it with a band aid. The next couple days the pain worsened and felt like pressure was building underneath, there seemed to be a whiteish “head” on it so a attempted to squeeze out the puss again. This time a lot of puss came out along with some blood. I noticed that when cleaned it looked as though it was a hole in my body. and there was still white stuff in the middle. I took tweezers to pull that out. it was slimy and hard to get because to me it just seemed like dead or infected tissue. after another two or three days of that it finally started to heal. I just cleaning it and a band aid on it. Well this has happened 4 times since then. My girlfriend has had the same types of sores. So with research I believe in understand it to be mrsa.
Note: I have not gotten a colture test to verify if it is mrsa, but my information is noteworthy.
this last time while doing research I learned a lot. First MRSA is not fully treatable by antibiotics, and resistant strands are impervious to even the strongest antibiotics like vancomycin which can cost you 40,000 dollars for the treatment. (It has to be done intravenously) Second, I am taking Oil of oregano and WOW. I have only taken it for 4 days now but it prevented a sore that i had started to get and it has substantially diminished my girlfriends two open sores. Please understand we are clean and healthy people. we are both in our twenties with what we thought were good immune systems.
But alas, O only believe that the oregano is capable of killing the infection topically. You see in doing research you find that MRSA can hide in Biofilm. A slime substance that the chemical nature of oregano cannot penetrate. that brings me to the third point. Silver sol. After alot of research i am going to be purchasing this stuff after the new year (when I have the money) This stuff can break through the biofilm and can MRSA. This stuff can actually do a lot!!! but anyways if anyone has read this and is interested in how the stuff works for me I will post again after my colture test next week and after i use silver sol.
otherwise feel free to email at tekrodrigo [at] yahoo.com
I have just battled my fourth MRSA infection on my breast. This time I went to an infectious disease doctor. Did the Hibiclens for 5 days, Bactroban up the most for 5 days. Clyndamyacin for two weeks and Bactrim for 3. Now I am on a 3-month course of Bactrim once a day. When I go back to see him I will have a blood test to check the liver and should be cut down to 3 times a week. Even six weeks later the area is a light purple color and itches but this flare up was terrible. Hope everyone gets better on here.
By the way have almost no symptoms on these meds and at the most I get on lil bump now that goes away in 3 days. I still itch but not like I did. Hope this helps everyone out there!
OK, I have not been tested for MRSA but am sure I have it because my symptoms are the same. “Spider bite” on the inner thigh and doubled the size of the inside of my thigh. Flu like symptoms. After that like 2 months later my underarms got some painful bumps and I just felt really sick. Went to doc and he gave me antibiotics without testing. Got them 3 more times and felt sicker and sicker each time adding dizziness and forgetfulness to the symptoms. My hubby works in a store that sales natural stuff so he started working on the problem cause by now we figured out what I have.
After much trial and error this is what has helped me and the least expensive way to deal with it. (by the way my husband does not sale this brand but it helps). Swanson brand for all of them…..Magnolia Bark 2 at night only(can make you tired), Olive Leaf Extract 2 twice a day, Meriva 2 twice a day. Now this is natural so you have to build it up in your system so if you are sick with it now, get your antibiotics and start this too. It usually takes 2-3 weeks for natural meds to get into your system. I know I still have it and we are looking for ways to enhance the immune system to kick it but have not found it yet.
Eunice, I have a similar story (dad/hospital –> recurring staph infection every 3 months for about 5 years now). After retreated attempts to battle this stuff with antibiotics alone, I’ve found a preventative cure in showering with benzoyl peroxide every day. Washing with this stuff daily for the past two years, and I’ve had only one major outbreak on my lower leg (and I blame that on an overnight trip to the beach when I forgot to bring the benzoyl peroxide). I’ve also had a couple minor outbreaks in my nose and the lobes of my ears over the past two years, which I think are pre-cursors to a large infection if left untreated and stamped out (the benzoyl peroxide will contain / knock those down within a few days).
Two common products you can find at most pharmacies are Oxy Maximum Wash and PanOxy (both 10% benzoyl peroxide — both are acne washes). And if you find this treatment works, Amazon sells multi-packs of Oxy Wash for under $20 (making for a pretty inexpensive ongoing preventative treatment).
After reading the comments, I decided to share my battle with MRSA. April 30, 2008 is when I first contracted MRSA. My father was very sick and in the hospital. I was going out of town that day for work and decided to visit him before I left town. I was at the hospital for nearly an hour. This is how I contracted MRSA, from the hospital (my father did not have it).
I traveled nearly 3 hours away from home to attend a 2 day training for work. I was in the hotel that night and began to have pain and discomfort while swallowing. I went to bed just thinking I had a sore throat. Within hours I awoke and my throat had swollen and was red with white bumps on my tonsils. I was sweating and chilling. I knew I had a fever. I put a cold washrag on my forehead and went back to sleep. I awoke again to pain in my throat and body aches. I decided that I should go home and to the doctor. It was a struggle to take a shower and pack my clothes that morning. I checked out of the hotel and drove the 3 hours home. I do not remember my trip. I realize now how lucky I was not to get in a wreck. I was so sick that I would drive with one eye shut while holding a cold water bottle on my forehead.
I went to the doctor as soon as I arrived home. I had a temp of 102.7 and my throat was nearly swollen shut. The doctor took one look at my throat and diagnosed me with strep. I was given 2 rosephine shots in my hips and told to go home and rest. I stayed home for over a week. I had major body aches, fever and trouble swallowing. I finally got over my ‘strep.’
In late July, I noticed white sores on my tonsils again and redness. I went to the doctor and the strep swab was a negative. The doctor swabbed my tonsils for a culture to confirm that it was strep type b. He gave me antibiotics to treat my ‘strep’ and sent me home. Three days later my doctor notified me that MRSA was on my tonsils. He prescribed me a stronger antibiotic. After a few days I was healed. Or so I thought…
For nearly 2 years I battled MRSA on my tonsils. I had tonsilitis and strep 9 times. Finally a specialist suggested I have my tonsils removed. So, on May 11, 2010 I had a tonsillectomy. My surgeon was astonished at how pitted and scarred my tonsils were. He had to cut very deep to remove all the scar tissue the MRSA had caused. I was 29 years old the time of my surgery and I was under great risks. Luckily, I had no complications. I was off work for 3 weeks. It was the worst pain ever. I had to sleep in a recliner and constantly drink water. If my throat became dry the pain was unbearable. I couldn’t take my full dose of hydrocodone because if I was knocked out I slept with my mouth open and my tonsils became dry. I couldn’t talk for 12 days after the surgery and when I did regain my voice; I could only say a few words before I would be in pain. I was happy to have the MRSA out of my body. Or so I thought…
I soon discovered that once you have MRSA you have it for life. I am now battling a abscess infected with MRSA on my inner thigh near my privates. The boil popped up last week and after tripling in size popped and drained on its own. A lot of pus drained from the boil. A few hours after the boil popped I had to go to the doctor. There was a hole big enough to stick the tip of my pinkie finger in it. The doctor swabbed and did a culture of the pus. They packed the hole and gave me Bactrim (with my history, they treated as if I had MRSA) and Bactroban ointment to apply around the wound. I have to go back to the doctor every 2 days to have the wound repacked. The culture confirmed that it is MRSA yesterday. I hope it heals quickly.
MRSA has affected my life tremendously. I am now a germaphobe. I will not enter a hospital or clinic without a mask, kleenex’s to use when opening doors and pushing elevator buttons, lysol spray and antibacterial liquid. Many say that I am overreacting, but they have never had MRSA. I encourage everyone to take every precaution necessary to avoid contracting MRSA!!
It may sound old school but I was searching for a simple cheap alternative to fix my problem.
I went to a fishing tackle store and bought a container of leeches and it only took one day two leeches and it was gone. I used a different leech both times so I wouldnt re-infect. Took out the infection and the natural Anticoagulant given off by the leech got rid of the hard mass under the skin.
Laura DeGaetano – good thing he’s your ex and that you were smart enough to get help. Glad you’re ok!
Thought I’d share my story. I worked in a hospital laundry facility for 6 weeks before I found another job. Following the 5th week, I began to get large, hard, painful boils on my thigh and buttocks. I went to an outpatient facility, where they told me they were suspected spider bites, and told me to apply a compress a few times a day. I was to stop back in 1 week. I stopped back in 1 week, but by that time they had burst (and felt much, much better). I had never seen so much pus from sores in my life. At the 2nd appointment, the nurse mentioned that perhaps they should have run a MRSA test. I didn’t know what MRSA was, exactly, at that time. I moved for the new job, and a week or 2 later I had more boils.
I knew they couldn’t have been spider bites at that point, so I went online and found a pic of MRSA that looked exactly like what I had. I went to an ER, and the doctor told me that they are trained to treat all boils as MRSA to be on the safe side, and that spider bites are extremely rare. They took a culture, and MRSA was confirmed. I was pretty upset, especially because I had thought they were spider bites and tried to let them air out somewhat, thinking that would help them to heal…what I was actually doing, though, was allowing for a possibility of it to spread, since the pus is extremely contagious.
I’ve since been told that once you have it, your body is “colonized” by the bacteria, whether you have another outbreak or not. I took bactrim, mupirocin, and tried using hibiclens while showering. The hibiclens dried my skin out, and brought on a mild eczema breakout. 2 of the eczema patches (on my shins) were not healing. I stopped using the hibiclens. The eczema itched terribly, and I’d often break them open by scratching in my sleep. After 2 months, I had a terrible eczema outbreak (not sure what brought it on). Blisters on my hands and feet, small patches all over the body. I got a prescription that seemed to help the small patches, but not the large ones on my shins, and more patches kept coming in as older ones healed. I finally got a steroid cream that works well on all the eczema with a prednisone prescription, but now the MRSA has returned, and I’m left battling both.
Eczema on the hands, feet, and shins (primarily), and MRSA on 1 wrist and both ankles. I’m not sure if anyone truly ever “beats” MRSA. I hope that something is found that eliminates it, though, because it causes a lot of stress and worry (for fear of spreading it to others), in addition to the pain/discomfort. I’ve spent a lot of money on gauze, bandages, and anti-bacterial cleansers, I’ve been washing clothing and towels after a single use, etc., etc. Seems like a losing battle that I’ll just have to live with every few months.
Hello. I have a 2 year old son who recently came down with mrsa. I am getting frustrated because this is his 3rd time getting it. He was a 24 week premature baby. He only weighed 1 pound 9 ounces. I have heard of mrsa being fatal in some cases. I am afraid that if it keeps coming back that it will become fatal to him. Should I take him to see a dermatologist?. Will my 1 year old come down with this too? Are they any home remedies for me to help out my 2 year old with mrsa? Is there any homeopathic stuff out there I can try? If anyone has any feedback please I am at wits end with these doctors. Thank you all so much!!!!!!!!
Not sure how I got MRSA….a Wednesday I noticed something appearing to be a spider bite on my right hand..I got some medicine from the Pharmacy and went on my vacation to Big Bear…By Friday it was swelling like a balloon, my now ex tried to pop it thinking if we get the venom out it would heal…felt a little better…Saturday it was more swollen as was my wrist & still hurt but I thought just cuz we messed with it…Sunday I felt sick and the swelling shot up my arm…my ex thought I was faking so I managed to get a stranger to take me…they said I had to be taken via ambulance to Loma Linda or I would lose my hand….found out it was MRSA…and had I waited one more day, I would have lost my right hand…and with the swelling going past my shoulder, I risked it going into my blood in which case they said I would have died. Thank God they cut my hand opened and got the meds in me before it came to those 2 things…worst pain of my life…took 2 months for my hand to heal…scar still hurts and itches 6 months later.
I got MRSA for the first time last year, and I thought I was bit by a spider, and i went to the doctor and of course it was MRSA. It took a month to get rid of it. I’ve never been in so much pain in my life. Dec 2010 I got it again but this time i caught it faster and the antibiotics didn’t work, and it buried its self into the tissue in my stomach. The doctor had to lance it open and pull the puss(cause it was attached to the tissue) outta the hole. I wanted to die, it was the worse pain imaginable. They even gave me a stuff to numb it. I’ve only had it twice but I have a weak immune system due to cervical cancer, so the doctor said it will probably come back every 6 months. I never thought this would happen to me. Living with MRSA gave me a bad rep also, people are to judgmental and have no idea what I’m going through.
I got MRSA from a scraped knee. I had fallen on the ground while carrying out 16-pound cat and,
instead of letting go of him I held onto him so he wouldn’t get hurt, and I ended up sliding across
the lawn and dirt – in shorts. I immediately went inside, washed it with peroxide, then with soap
and water, put ointment on it and put a band aid over it. I thought I was good to go.
In four days my knee hurt so badly that I couldn’t kneel down on it; I ended up going to a night time doctors’ office. They said it was
definitely staph, but weren’t sure if it was MRSA. So they pulled the scab back – without any pain meds – and jammed a long culture swab into the center of the injury. I Almost went through the ceiling, and I WAS crying from the pain. They prescribed something for me and said that if I had come in one day later they would have had me admitted to the hospital immediately.
I ended up taking a medicine called AVALOX (my primary care physician called me and said that it was indeed MRSA and that it only responded to AVALOX.
I dealt with staph (early stages of mrsa) with my son involved in sports at school. It was going around and I knew that he would have a chance on getting it so a kept an eye out for any marks. When he came to me and showed me his bump I knew right away and went to his Drs. I can tell you from experience in dealing with this you are in for a fight. All I can say is that when dealing with that you have to sanitize tremendously. Every time he got in the shower I was bleaching his towel and drying it on high heat for at least an hr. Keep it covered with meds given by your dr. Clean it at least 3 times a day put new band aid and ointment each time you clean it. Try your best not to let other members of the family exposed to it. Lots of bleach. Bleach tub after each use. Don’t share towels. That’s a big no no. Before I knew it, it was gone. About 10 days.
Thanks for all the stories and advice. I am recovering from MRSA on my outer upper thigh. I think I got it when I got a scratch playing with a friend’s dog and then I used a public toilet at an airport without using the paper seat liner. It started just as you said, a small pimple, thought it was a spider bite.
The doctor dug it out, gave me Bactrim, and said I should stand in the shower and scrub the wound until it bleeds three times a day to keep it clean. A different doctor told me to wash the spot with hibiclens. The bottle says for external use only and this hole is over an inch deep. Anyone know if I should use it on the wound?
i was training again for stna because of time ran out. OK i went to my clinicals at a nursing home and went in to service a pt there was no warning sign on door?? to wear protective mask gloves gown?? it was removed. a girl training with me asked me? did u just come out of that room? i said yes why?? she had been there the day before.she told me that man just got over mrsa!! i was never ever warned of this? as a new trainee.what? i immediately i ran to wash my hands face and clean up. i went home told my husband what happened he said they r gonna be responsible if u get mrsa? i have since broken out with sores on my skin! my doctor said its insect bites??? i don’t buy that! should i contact medical board where? how? help!!
In the article it stated that MRSA is “NOT SPREAD THROUGH THE AIR”. I got extremely ill in July 2007. I thought I had a head & chest cold, because my older daughter (who was 8 months pregnant at the time) & her boyfriend (Ashley & Levi) were living with me at the time and that’s what they had. So when I came down with the symptoms, I figured I’d feel better in 4 to 5 days, because that’s how long it was for them.
I nearly killed myself waiting out this alleged head/chest cold. My younger daughter, Krissy, started asking me to let her take me to the ER about day 3. She truly felt I was sicker than I should be for a cold. I, of course, refused. Like everyone else, I hate the ER!
On the 5th day, i had progressed to the point that the task of simply STANDING UP from a seated position in a rocking char TOOK MY BREATH AWAY to the point I literally felt starved for oxygen! It terrified Krissy and me, especially given my Ventolin (inhaler for asthma) didn’t help at all. I finally gave in and went to the ER.
As I walked in, I must have looked really bad! I couldn’t breath because I had walked the 30ft from the car into the ER and the gal at the desk freaked out and called the Dr’s and RN’s to the lobby for me.
I ended up being admitted for 5 1/2 days with PNEUMONIA caused by the Pneumococcus Bacteria, and MRSA. I was quarantined for 3 days because the MRSA was in my lungs, and therefore it was AIR-BORN and I was extremely contagious.
The Dr’s were preparing my family on days 2 & 3 for my death. They were fairly certain that I would not survive, because I had got to the point that I couldn’t even TALK without losing my breath. Fortunately I won the battle and got better! I was released the evening of the 5th day.
The MRSA damaged my lungs to the point that I was diagnosed with COPD 2 months after I was rid of the pneumonia.
I just wanted you to know that MRSA is HIGHLY contagious, even through the air in some circumstances.
I had what they called Community Acquired MRSA. I have no idea how I initially got it. Perhaps Ashley & Levi had it also but they were able to fight it off, but not before spreading it to me? Krissy never did get anything at all, Thank God!
If you need me to document any of this, particularly the airborn transmission ability of the MRSA I would be happy to provide you with my records from that time frame.
Thank You for hearing me out!
A Most Grateful MRSA PNEUMONIA SURVIVOR!
~Frankie
I had mrsa about 3 yrs. ago.I had cut my leg open on the foot plate of my wheelchair. Had to have eight stitches. It healed up, but about a year later I noticed my leg by my ankle was turning red. About midnight it had traveled about half way up. I called my daughter and told her what was happening. she said to give it a little longer & see what happens. A couple of hour’s later it had spread almost to my knee. I called her back & she took me to the e.r. The doc. there described it as mrsa & admitted me to the hospital right away. By the next day the whole back of my leg was broken out in big blisters and were draining. All the nerve endings were at the top of my skin.
I couldn’t lay my leg on anything & no one could touch it. I was in the hospital for 3 wks. and it didn’t show any sign’s of healing. So I went to a bigger hospital that was better equipped for this infection. They gave me medication’s by IV. As soon as 1 was empty they hung another. After a wk. of this I was finally healed. Somehow the germ had entered into the cut I had on my leg a yr. ago. It lay dormant there all that time until it finally broke out. The back of my leg looked like flesh eating bacteria and was more painful than anything I could ever have dreamed of. So far I have not had anymore outbreak’s but still live in fear of another 1. It left my leg a dark purplish red from my ankle to my knee. The doctor said I came close to dying from it.
I got a small itchy bump on sat and thought it was a mosquito bite and then the next day it became swollen and red and got so bad I couldn’t walk on it or put any pressure on that leg. I went to the emergency room and the Dr told me it was a bee sting and gave me antibiotics “just in case” and sent me on my way. Well it is Thursday and the pain has not subsided and i am feeling pain in my muscle the swelling has gone down some and it has a black spot in the middle. Was wondering if this was a spider bite or staph because my boyfriend just got over a staph infection on his leg that kept spreading and we originally thought was a spider bite too. I want to go back to the doc but don’t wanna waste my time if im gonna get the same response from before. HELP PLEASE! 🙂
Just recently i spent over a week in the hospital. i got bitten at work and thought it was a spider. i had a red ring on my stomach and it hurt and was warm. im a security guard and i work in a booth near the woods. after going to my moms and rolling around in pain and crying in my sleep she finally called 911. my temp was 106 i had chills and a fever, aches and pains, a headache and i was dizzy. soon as i got to the hospital they thought i was in shock. after 2 hours i was put in a room and spent a week with an iv and fluids, pain meds and antibiotics. finally they said it was mrsa. i was floored. i caught it early thank goodness. please get checked. don’t assume its a spider bite. GO TO THE HOSPITAL.
My 2 yr old popped up with a bump on her bum about 7 months ago and I noticed it and went to rub it and it popped out on its on so I took her the her doc the next day thinking it was a spider bite as did the doctor so she put her on some antibiotics and it cleared up, about 3 months later she had another one pop up on the same side almost in the same spot, it was not at a complete head yet so I took her to the E.R and the mashed it and got all the pus out and a culture and gave her some more antibiotics. About 5 days later the culture came back and of course it had to be MRSA I was scared to death for her and my other child and I also work in a retirement home as a care giver so I was scared I would somehow give it to one of my residents…
well it cleared up and about 4 months later she came up with another one same spot so I took her back to the E.R and he barely lanced it just enough to get a culture and said it should drain thought the night well it didn’t so I took her to her regular doc the next morn and she didn’t wanna lance it til it came to a complete head she gave me head packs to put in her diaper and some bactrim antibiotic cream and by the night it came to a head and i just drained it myself because she was in so much pain from all the pressure and by the next day she could sit without screaming…. they have a soap called hibiclense that you wash the infected area with and it seems to be helping you can get it at a pharmacy or walmart….It is a terrible thing for anyone to go through especially a child it has been the most scariest thing I think I have ever been through.. good luck to anyone else going through it god bless.
I was diagnosed with MRSA in September 2009. I never had the large painful bumps associates with MRSA. I would get tiny “knots” under my skin on my underarms. I would squeeze them and unbelievable amounts of pus would come out. Sometimes nothing but regardless the “knot” remained. I saw the doctor because a clear liquid started to come from my left nipple. That’s is what tested for MRSA. I have to go back to the doctor now as my left nipple has begun to when squeezed produce a green/brown liquid. I’m really nervous. I have 2 kids and think I am pregnant with my third. Waiting on the clinic to call back and confirm my appointment, any similar stories?
Can it be like a ton of pimples?? I have a bunch on my abdomen, legs– they have told me its not scabies, chicken pox or shingles, and cultured it yesterday. Waiting for results. They itched for a day and now hurt really bad. Everything I have read about MRSA, it appears as only one spot. I have had the rash for 3 days now… and am on Cephalexin and Mupriocin cream.. plus have to wash affected ares with Hibiclens.. but still spreading!! Any advice or help??
I have been fighting mrsa for the last FIVE yrs. yes that’s 5yrs.It comes back every three months except this time it came back in two weeks.some times i can get rid of it just by zyvox if i get it in time.This last time I needed Vancomycin. I would like to know if there is anyone that knows what i can do.I usa hipaclens twice a week.
Thanks
Pat
hello, i have a little hot,red, kinda itchy area with a little white bump in the middle. i popped it and nothing came out, it’s close to maybe a inch or more under my right boob, i am getting scared and i dont know if it’s a type of bite. or .. maybe it could be merca? please help me i am very scared. i have been putting this cream on there, and i put alcohol on it also, i’ve only had it today (3.6.10) but i really want to know what it is because i have a daughter, and i am worried. please help.
I’ve been dealing with MRSA for over six months now. I’ve been washing with Hibiclens every day–per my doctor. I noticed more red spots on my skin which is always the beginning of the MRSA. I grabbed a Q-Tip and the Hibiclens. I dabbed some Hibiclens on the red spots and within a day they went away. Washing with the Hibiclens and also leaving it on my skin has stopped the MRSA. I have extremely sensitive skin and my skin is fine with having the Hibclens left on my skin. I have also had work order Saniguard spray from Allimed (they also have foggers). Saniguard is used at the gym I go to and there have not been any reports of MRSA there. Hope this helps!
to some of you who think you’ve been bitten by a spider you had what looked like a spider bite but all along was MRSA, a spider didn’t give it to you.
glad I found this site.. soo much information about this topic..
I’ve had mrsa for 2 yrs now. had 5 bumps in the 1st year. last year I had non. I take a bath with a special soap, wash my bedding wit bleach, and wash my hands. its a horrible experience. and u break more if u get surgery.
god bless u
&melanie. life goes on. I did wat u did and got so depressed I felt like nothing but u gotta get up and keep ur head up .
xoxo
In my rose garden on Nov. 8 my middle finger was stung by a pus a caterpillar. Allergic and went to hospital for steroid and antihistamine. Three weeks later a biopsy was done and the area had staph. Four antibotics later, I still have the red tissue and some swelling. How do you know when the MRSA is gone? It was under the skin where you see the outline of the asp.
It is heartbreaking reading all these horror stories. I have had sever spider bites also….could also be MSRA. none too serious so far. I started taking2000 units of vitamin D3 each day , i believe this has greatly improved my immune system ,as i no longer have as many aches & pains (i’m 59 yr old male) and my gout is MUCH improved, and arthritis is better too. it has also improved my winter time blues a bit also. my knee is no longer a good weather predictor. if this helps anyone, that would be great.
thanks, Dave
i have merca and it is a deadly infection and is highly contagious and should be treated with care….my mom think i have had it from a dirt bike wreck 6 yrs ago but it appeared on my big toe….the doctor numbed and cut it open and found merca in my blood it is not curable….it lives in your body.
It is Dec 4 2009 and I am dealing with MRSA now for three weeks.
I started out with one boil and went to doc who said to put bacitracin cream and a band aid. That went away. Then a few mos. later there were two more, which started out like a pimple. Again I put bacitracin and a band aid. Three weeks ago I went to take a bath. I had not been feeling well, a slight fever, but chocked that up to grandkids all having flu and coming around me. I went to the bathroom and lifted my clothes and the whole underside of my belly was full of pus and blood and there was a hole the size of a half dollar, the skin around it had turned black and the surrounding area of that was a horrid yellow and red…about 5 inches in diameter. My daughter rushed me to the ER *three weeks ago*. It wasn’t until yesterday that my doctor told me it was MRSA as I had found two more spots and went to him to check it out.
He and the hospital told me they were Diabeticsores as my sugar at the time was 400. Little did they know. For two days they worked on lowering my blood sugar and pressure and didn’t give much of a hoot to the sore. The surgeon lanced it and that has healed, but now I have two more. I was put on Bactrim again. I read about Tumeric and eating yogurt, so I started that on my own. This sure has been a pain. I haven’t been able to sleep from pain in one of my legs. I have never ever had problems with my legs. I believe its because of all this medication, but the doc insists it is not and wants me to have a Catscan and MRI. I refused until I get this MRSA under control. I think these doctors and hospitals don’t know what they are doing…and just experiment with you and hope you get better. I certainly didn’t have diabetic sores ….!
The doc packed the first one and that was changed daily for five days… I was told to AIR it out after that so it would heal…..well, that is not true…it should be covered in sterile pads and washed with peroxide.
Don’t think MRSA is a joke..and get more than one opinion.
God Bless everyone who has it…you are in for a rough ride. Happy holidays!
My 2 yr old daughters face suddenly erupted out of nowhere. cold sores the doctor said. but 2 days later it was worse so I went back. Golden Staph. 2 types of antibiotics have not helped. MRSA.
I have been to 5 doctors now, but doctors don’t seem concerned because she is not feeling unwell. and it doesn’t seem to be bothering her. But I am concerned. Will her face scar? How long will it take to heal? I need her to get better so she can go back to day care before I lose my job… and my mind…. I feel terrible taking her to the supermarket, to my other kids’ school and kinder, but I dont have a choice. Some people say its very contagious, some say not…
And Where did it come from? I have never heard of staph…..only I do get pimples and boils on my bum and have done for 18 yrs – since I was 6….. have seen possibly 50 doctors / natropaths etc about them over the years. None have ever mentioned staph…… but now I am wondering if that has been my problem for 18 yrs….The only treatment that has ever worked for me is not eating any fruit.
I have was diagnosed with MRSA since March of this year. It is horrible and painful. I have no clue where I got it from. I have been on Bactrim on and off and it doesnt seem to work. I walk a lonely path because I do not want to infect anyone else. As a result, I do not date, go out with friends and stay far away from my family. It was dormant for two months. Low and behold I had 5 spots with into days. What really sucks is that I got this because I have eczema and its itchy leaving open wounds. So imagine having both in the same area.
I have been getting these (boils?) for over 5 years.They are really painful and they look exactly like the photos above.I only get them on my upper thighs and in my armpits…anyone know what i can do?Maybe im crazy but i squeeze and pop them all the time,and it hurts.I am not the hospital type of person,i prefer to deal with things on my own and let my body do the work,should i go see a doctor?
Sorry, I don’t have a photo. My daughter is 3 years old. Exactly where a baby diaper leaves a crease in the thigh, she got a tiny, pin head pimple. I though, that’s odd, a baby getting a pimple. So, I watched it. By night, it got a head on it, and a raised red area around, the area of an eraser head. I said to my husband “If that gets bigger by tomorrow, I’m taking her to the doctor.’ Sure enough, the next morning, I said ‘Spider bite, for sure!” The white head was bigger, and the surrounding red area had spread out to silver dollar size, and you could see fine little veins, and it felt hot. She was sore. The doctor nicked it with a sterile scalpule for culture, put her on bactrim cream and liquid (which I was nervous about because my cousin got sjs from taking it).
Doc said : was her at bathtime with disinfectant hand soap, not baby soap…unless it irritates her skin, then use the strongest thing that will not irritate her. You should just wash all the kids with this soap, he says. Wash her hands often through the day. (Mean while I’m freaking out.) He calls me back 3 days later and tells me she has MRSA from an infected insect bite of unknown origin. Don’t share her towels. Don’t let her swim in unclorinated pools. Wipe the potty seat with disinfectant wipes. Clean and cover the wound. Do the other kids have bumps? OTHER KIDS? (On and on…my head is swimming.) Mean while, I had just had a hysterctomy. 3 weeks after this, I come down with a weird red (no head on it) bump on my abdomen, next to my freshly healed incision. It’s the size of a penny. Next day, there’s 3 of them, in a raised track, 1/2 an inch high. I have 103f fever. Go to my doc. She puts me on bactrim and percocet, sends me to a surgeon. Surgeon says “I can tell you right now, this is MRSA. ” She lances it, like a sadist , with no numbing agent. MRSA sores, for some reason are extremely, and unusually painful. I want to die. I dug my fingers into my ribs and screamed and cried. She said “The medicine will not work with all of this pus here.” Culture comes back positive for MRSA. I go home with a 5 inch long open incision.
Clean with peroxide tomorrow, she says. ‘Listen carefully” (Now I’m ready to crap my boots) ‘I want you to put the bactrim cream in your nose to kill the staph in your nose, then scrub in the shower twice a day, every day, with iodine and antimicribial soap, even in your hair and on your face…everywhere…make sure you scrub under your nails. Wash your hands all the time. Bleach your shower and towels. Get disinfectant wipes and wipe all your doorknobs, light switches, and things that everyone touches. This was back in April and I am doing it to this day. MRSA is everywhere. And I am a confirmed germaphobe forever. Everytime I see a pimple…Everytime, I freak out. I clean it out and walk around with dots of iodine on my face. I spend an hour bleaching my bathroom every day. When I’m done showering, I am ready for naked surgery…and I’m not exaggerating. Don’t mess with MRSA
So, I live right outside Camp Lejeune Marine Corps Base in NC where my husband is stationed and MRSA is a big issue around here with all the Marines. Well, my 18 month old daughter somehow contracted MRSA and I had no idea what it was. I thought it was a spider bite at first because the first abscess I saw was on the backside of her arm, above her elbow. When I rubbed my finger over it, it practically exploded and oozed out a bunch of brown pus and blood. So, I took her to the doctor the next day and they put her on Bactrim (sulfamethoxazole and trimethoprim). They advised me to just keep the wound clean and she would be fine.
Well, about a week later, she had the same thing show up on her bum, so I immediately took her into the Naval Hospital on base and in the few hours we sat there waiting, the area became even more inflamed. By the time we got back to the room, it was very large, very red and very painful for her. It was to the point that I couldn’t even pick her up or touch anywhere near her bum. So, one of the docs drained it by just poking a hole in the area because he didn’t want to actually cut her open because she was so little. And I’ll tell you…I’ve never seen a child scream in so much agony in my life and at the same time be so tired that they are doing it when they are half asleep. And that’s after the numbing. It was absolutely horrible. They put her on Bactrim again and advised me to give her six sits baths a day for at least ten minutes each time to help keep the area cleaned out. After the second day, I had to pull out the gauze packing which was very tiny.
About two weeks after that, when I was really hoping it wouldn’t come back, I found another one on her other butt cheek. I didn’t even notice anything was wrong because she seemed fine, was sitting on her potty seat fine all day and never whined about anything. Well, at about 7PM, she fell on her butt and started screaming and crying. So, I had a feeling it was back. I checked and sure enough, she had another really warm, really red, really hard area that seemed to appear out of nowhere. It looked different than the other two though. The first two had white “heads” to them. This one didn’t even have that yet. So, I took her into the Naval Hospital again but this time because of how rapidly it was “growing”, they decided to anesthetize her and cut it open. I was told that hardly any pus came out of it at all but there was an enormous amount of pressure which was making her entire butt cheek really hard. This time, a different doc was handling it and he cut a hole in her bum that I could have put both of my thumbs into. It was packed with gauze, they put her on Bactrim once again, told me to alternate Tylenol and Motrin for pain and check up with her PCM. So, the next day, I had to pull the packing out and when I did, she writhed around in pain until the two foot of gauze was completely out. I was astonished at what I saw. This MRSA is nothing to mess with. If you have it, get to a doctor. I hope hers doesn’t keep coming back but I guess that’s the joys of living around a military base. After this was all said and done, I found out there has been an outbreak of MRSA on the base recently….it was really nice that they let everyone know….not.
My 1 year old son had MRSA a couple weeks ago. It started out looking like a mild diaper rash that was spreading down his thighs. One of the red bumps got really bad like described on here. I thought he had a spider bite because I had one on my leg at the same time. Then a second bump became like the first and I called the Dr. He drained some and sent off for testing and gave me an antibiotic. He told me it looked like MRSA and that anyone in the family could be carrying but it wasn’t a big deal.
Now I got another “bite” on my upper leg/ lower butt and it got really bad. I went to my dr. and he didn’t say whether it was a spider bite or MRSA. He gave me an antibiotic that is commonly used to treat MRSA and sent me on my way.
After reading some of the posts on this page about spider bites that caused MRSA and severe cases of MRSA, I am completely freaked out!!! It doesn’t help that my mom keeps telling me that I need to find the spider that is biting me because it’s just going to keep coming back to bite me! I was already afraid of spiders, but I am becoming scared to death of them and MRSA now!
Okay, this sunday (june 7th, 2009) i was at a state park where I had a very bad fall followed by wrapping my foot into a tree branch…… well, we noticed the swelling from what we now know is a severe sprang as the doctor put it and to puncture wounds as well.. neither one was very big nor painful………well, my foot kept swelling and turning almost purple…. but around the puncture wounds it started becoming increasingly red….. so, i went to the hospital to ofcourse see if my foot was broken……… well, they said no but we think you have resistant staph…… now, i have been taking the antibiotic (they prescribed me) called clindamycin for 3 days now….ANYWAYS, now i am having trouble breathing like really bad— yes i am a smoker but I have never felt pain like this ANYWAYS, i see it can affect ur lungs just wanted some info on it
I am glad for the information that you have presented on your website. I was horrified and began to feel sick when seeing the pictures of what could have been for me as well so I felt compelled to share my story.
I was out in my garden, in a skirt, pretending to be Martha Stewart. While sitting on the pavement near a low lying juniper bush I felt a prick on my inner thigh. I just moved over some, thinking I mistakenly sat on some cut bushes. That was on a Friday. By Monday evening I was feeling as if I was was getting sick and had an overall “bad feeling.” On Tuesday afternoon, when visiting the restroom at work, I felt sore on my inner thigh and thought that a mole there was just irritated. When I touched the area, it felt swollen. When I placed a wash cloth there, I noticed two sets of blood stains like pinholes and I moisturized it with baby oil. At the end of the day, I had a headache, felt tired and “sick” and my thigh was pulsating. I could not understand what was going on and inspected my thigh more thoroughly with a a mirror and found two sets of what could be fang marks! I had seen, what I now know to be brown recluse spiders in our garden, and had caught a few in the house that summer. I am petrified of spiders and called poison control immediately. They laughed at me when I expressed my concerns and advised me that no spiders in the US are poisonous and all I need is a antibiotic treatment from my doctor and should not be concerned.
By Wednesday I had fever and chills and horrible drawing pains. By Thursday I could not put my legs together to walk. There was a big pulsating lesion or abscess there and by the time I went to the ER, it was draining blood and pus.
Well, although I recounted the story to the triage nurse, she did not warrant any truth to my thought of it being a spider bite and, when I asked if she would at least draw blood and send it to the lab while I waited to be seen by the doctor, the lab results could confirm or deny my suspicions. She too laughed and waved me with unconcern to sit in the waiting room. It had been five hours by the time I was seen, and that was only at the insistence of others in the waiting room because the blood and pus was dripping on to the floor and they claimed that i looked as if I were going to faint.
They performed surgery to drain and remove the infected skin, leaving a whole as wide and as deep as a quarter. They discharged me as if I were a diabetic with an abscess (an assumption because I was overweight and African American). I was instructed to return two days later to review the healing.
Two days later, the hospital called and indicated that I was given the wrong antibiotic for what the lab results indicated was Staphylococcus Aureus and that the antibiotic was not strong enough to protect me! I could have died with the infection spreading all throughout my body had I not returned as instructed thinking that everything was probably fine! I was given Levaquin and told that I would need to see a surgeon and schedule surgery in an operating room. They suggested I find a cancer surgeon because the wound was exposing my bone and a cancer surgeon could work best with repairing it.
Without continuing to give you a day by day account of this incident, suffice it to say that a higher power intervened for me and what I was told would have taken 8 weeks to heal took only three! The main points I want to make is that the medical industry, perhaps, at that time, no one understood brown recluse spiders pose a great danger with Staphylococcus Aureus; also, no one took me seriously when I indicated that I had been bitten by a spider, or even took my suggestion to draw blood for lab work while I waited to be seen ….!
Now my question to you is this: this happened in 2003. In the past two years, I have noticed vertical lines on my nails: they are not raised and there are no splits. I used to get artificial nails done frequently but stopped just about a year ago. A friend said that these lines are an indication of yeast buildup in my body. I also seem to have a consistent buildup of mucous in my lungs which the expectorate is white, a little cotton like surrounded by clear mucous. When reading the information about yeast infections and seeing that it can be generated from Staphylococcus Aureus from spider bites (your website) I am concerned that spider bite incident is not over and done with. Could you please advise? I would like to have any information from other’s that you have compiled or any trend that you have seen with these spider bites and subsequent symptoms from Staphylococcus Aureus.
I am extremely appreciative for your information.
Zelda
I had ventral hernia repair with mesh and partial tummy tuck to hold it all in Feb 2007. The hernia was caused by a perforayed dueodenum surgery done Dec 2005 which had MRSA in it. I have been diagnosed with 5cm hernia with fat in the hernia, no intetine in the hernia. The past 3 months I have been having SOB, joint aches, chills, chest pain, back pain and low grade fever, I have also had burning in the closed hernia repair site. Is it possible my MRSA is active in the old hernia repair site and if so how can I have the MRSA ruled out?
11 Years ago my13 year old daughter passed away ,multi system organ failure , due to MRSA . She had no open sores at the time of her admission to the children’s hospital in mpls . To this day we still do not know where she contracted the bacteria. I have interviewed with the BBC and also with Micheal Shnayerson who wrote a book called ” The Killers Within” If anyone out there can help please email moniponi24@ yahoo.com . I appreciate any thing helpful. Thank You.
HI ! I’m looking for some help. My brother-in-law had surgery for his ACL in September. He had to have emergency surgery on Dec. 15 due to the knee beeing infected. They believe it was a staph infection. The doctors removed the screw and washer and believed they had found the source of his infection. However, two weeks later he has been in and out of the hospital with a high fever and aches. He has a chest PICC, which has been in and removed and placed back in again. He is still not better! He is still in the hospital and the doctors are not telling my sister much. I feel for her because she lives three thousand miles away from us and is trying to take care of their triplet four year old sons on her own! Do you think he has MRSA? Is there and advice that someone can share with me to pass onto her so she can get some answers!!! She just called saying he looks awful, fever, shaking, and difficulty breathing!!
I’m sure I also have mrsa, it’s been about a month now and I have had four(4) painfully outbreaks on my legs. I really advise anyone who might have mrsa to not wait to see if it goes away on its own to get checked out.
Hi, there. I live outside Portland, OR. This is a tad embarrassing…I thought I had a zit (or sebaceous cyst) on my breast, and so I’ve been treating it w/ alcohol, hydrogen peroxide, etc. It is Nov 7th and it HURTS LIKE CRAZY, and my astute roomie says it looks like some sort of bite. (Actually, it looks like a third nipple, but we won’t go there!) Brassieres chafe like the dickens, as does merely touching it. The first day I noticed it (2 days ago) it was the size of a pea. Today it seems to have broadened in area & has some peeling skin around the darkened center. At first, I freaked, thinking of some sort of breast cancer (I’m 42) but a bite looks a lot more plausible. I have spent time sleeping in friends’ basements recently, so perhaps a spider bite?
Nov 12: I went to get my bite checked last Saturday, when a doctor says, “Oh, wow,” it does not inspire confidence! She concluded it was an abscess or…MRSA! She put me on Bactrim (horse pill-sized antibiotics), recommended hot packs 3x/day and wanted to see me Mon or Tues. I thought that was a little soon, so I scheduled it for tomorrow (Wed.) Well, right now, I’m counting the minutes til the checkup. The abscess/bite/MRSA has expanded incredibly and is NOT draining, as the doc had hoped it would. Also, it has a dark/blackish center, leading me to believe something is necrotizing (???) I’m hoping I don’t have to have anything excised tomorrow, but at this point, it would be a relief!
Thanks for listening. Hope this can help some folks.
AJ in Oregon
Hi, Jim,
Thank you for writing back! Yeah, I kind of figured posting pictures of that particular area of my anatomy might cause some problems…
BTW, went to my doc’s for a recheck yesterday (today is Nov 13th). I guess the hot packing & Bactrim are doing SOME good–she says the red area looks to have receded slightly and that the center part is softer. The dark area I had feared was necrotized tissue was actually dried blood that had pooled there. She still was not pleased that it had not drained on its own yet, though. So out came the lancet, and, sans anesthesia (she said the area was too close to the surface to be affected and she didn’t like sticking things into breast tissue–good by me) she opened the sore. Clenched teeth & fists aside, it felt good to have SOMETHING finally happening w/ this thing! Like many of the photos/videos on your site, it was a torrent o’ blood-tinged pus, but it was just the beginning, and I need to keep draining it at home.
I was meeting my boyfriend immediately after the appointment, and didn’t think pus-draining would be terribly romantic, so I put it off til the evening. It somewhat grosses me out to do it by myself–which is weird, I’m a vet tech & I deal w/ animal abscesses, fecal exams & other unpleasant fluids–but I know it has to be done! Oh, and the doctor did swab for a culture, so hopefully I should find out by next week at the latest what bit or took up residence on my skin. She seems to be really leaning toward MRSA, but I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.
Thanks again, Jim, you do have a terrific, very informative site.
PS I actually love spiders and have never seen as many in my life as I did after moving here to Oregon 15 yrs ago!
Nov 18……….
Jim,
Hi, AJ here. The doc finally got back w/ me re: the culture results. Ta da: MRSA! Apparently, it is out there in epidemic proportions these days, though I still can’t figure out how I contracted it, as I’m not a hugely social person & I’m allergic to the gym & team sports. 🙂 I asked whether it was zoonotic (as I do work around animals) and she said she honestly wasn’t sure. I’ve done some internet research, however, and found several articles concerning the definite possibility of zoonotic transmission to veterinary personnel:
vet.cornell.edu/FHC/news/mrsa.htm
avma.org/onlnews/javma/nov08/081115c.asp
wormsandgermsblog.com/articles/another_category/test_subcategory/
Then again, seeing as my nickname at work is “Fangmagnet,” I’m really starting to wonder if dealing w/ all these random cats (in a no-kill cat shelter in the on-site hospital) could’ve been the method of transmission…
As for the “bite” site itself, you can see from the pic below that it’s resolved into just a bit of a crater (there’s been no serious drainage for several days now) w/ a bit of redness & dried skin surrounding it. At any rate, since the pus drained, it doesn’t hurt anymore, thank goodness!
Another thing my doc said was that the incidence of actual spider bites seen are few & far between–that the majority (if not all that she’s seen) turn out to be MRSA.
Anyhow, thanks again, Jim, for riding this out w/ me & all the other folks out there who find strange wounds/infections on their bodies–you do a wonderful service for the community.
Take care!
I just dealt with a MRSA staph infection a couple of months ago, not the best experience of my life. it started on my cheek bone and by the end of the week the whole left side of my face was swollen and was starting to move down my neck making breathing difficult. This is an extremely painful infection and you should not try to pop or drain it yourself you can cause it to enter your bloodstream causing blood poisoning and allow the infection to spread to other organs including your brain, lungs, etc…. so as you can see theses infections are deadly and should be treated right away if you go to your doctor and they automatically claim spider bite without checking you should ask him to do a staph infection check, they are often mistaken for spider bites. I sent Jim some pictures of the infection so you can see the progession of it, it ends abrubtly because I was admitted to the hospital and was there for about a week.
Oct. 4. 2008
Got a few spider bites about 2 weeks ago. These were on my neck. They werent as bad as others. But a week ago noticed a large bump under my hair line on neck.It looked like another spider bite. A week went by and I treated as usual but I developed a severe headache, extreme tiredness and feeling faint. The area was extremely swollen and so painful, I could not touch it. Went to Dr. and he said a staph infection, then he told me I had MRSA. He wanted to drain area but he said he was afraid of spreading the infection. He put me on Clindamycin for 10 days. Told to use hot packs and try and keep covred. This is hard since it in in my scalp area. He said to return in about 5 days if not better. He also said I would probably feel worse for a couple of days because of the meds. This morning the back of my head is throbbing and burning.
I have had other bites before. I think I get them from my garden. This is the worst reaction I have ever had.
My main concern is that I raise a child with primary immune deficiency and MRSA is bad if she catches it.
Thanks for listening.
Bette-Jo
Washington
Shortly after posting my comment, I had to go into the ER due to the site becoming worse. I had to be rushed into surgery that day. I was in the hospital for 7 days. I now have a PICC line that goes into my heart from my inner upper arm. Through this PICC line, I receive a strong antibiotic. I will have this 11 inch line (similar to an IV line) for 8 weeks. I give my self daily treatments through IV’s. For those who are reading this, MRSA is a serious infection. Please seek medical attention and receive doctors advise ASAP. I am a healthy individual who has never had any diseases or infections. My immune system could not fight it off with the standard MRSA dosages. I sanitize everything that I come in contact with due to bacteria that I may pass along to others. My heart and prayers go out to anyone that has MRSA.
I have had two out breaks of MRSA now. I was presribed sulfamethoxazole for 30 days at taking 2 pills twice a day. I am concerned with me taking the medication for this length that my system will be come adjusted to the antibiotic. And, if for some reason, in the future I have another outbreak that the medication will not work. Can you please advise. Also, My husband and I were discused becoming pregnant. Is MRSA curable? Or will it possible stay in my system for the rest of my life. I am just worried that I might pass it along to the unborn child.
Some interesting update published in BBC News 8th May 2008.
Doctors working in Winchester and Eastleigh Healthcare NHS Trust (UK) begun prescribing the insertion of cannulae – a small tube used for giving intravenous fluids. Since they introduced this policy last November there have been no new cases of MRSA infections.
This figure covers all forms of MRSA, including bloodstream infections (also known as bacteraemia) and wound infections. This compares to 2007/08 when there was 11 reported bloodstream infections.
This proves you can stop introducing antibiotic resistant bacterial infections in patients if you stop using IV Cannula. This proves my observation and hypothesis is correct. This also tells us that bacteraemia occurring due to spread from wounds may be wrong and will need to further investigation. Wound infection probably occurs through blood stream infection.
I am a Medical Technologist and have taken most of the med school classes even though I was not accepted into med school. I do have a rare tumor and have gone through 6 months of IV antibiotics for my wife because she was beaten during a home invasion and the resulting damage to her face caused infection to set up in her bone marrow.
Between the two of us, we have been to Mayo Clinic, to research projects at University hospitals, to specialists at Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis and for YEARS of seeking treatment in MANY places. If I were you, I would contact the Centers for Disease Control in Atlanta, Georgia directly. If you have difficulty getting through, or getting an answer to what is the best antibiotics to receive at this time for the MRSA infection (also Wikipedia offers a lot of suggestions!), but I would keep calling and keep calling.
Doctors told me that I would die by 2001 and here it is 2008 and I am still kicking! I am able to carry out a mostly normal life which is a lot better than being DEAD! The only thing that saved me was my wife’s and my persistence and my family doctor’s willingness to believe what we told him and let us try the medications and treatments that we thought were working best–even when other specialists said they did not work!
Now those same specialists say that I may live almost a full lifetime! Don’t give up! Don’t let anyone who says negative stuff or gets tired of listening to you get you down! Just keep trying! New medications are developed every day! And sometimes your own body kicks in and helps!
Good luck and keep trying the Centers for Disease Control even if they don’t want to hear from you! Ask them about the treatments for both situations–MRSA and also for recluse spider bites. It might be best to make two different calls and ask about the spider bite first. Be as nice as you can but be persistent! Persistence makes the difference!
Try to get them to know you and to feel sympathy for you and your loved one. Also, expect a LONG fight! There are just some diseases that take YEARS to fight but the end result is well worth it! I hope Andre gets well soon! As a common cat poster says “Hang in there, Baby!”
Rhonda’s comment that spider bite may be linked could be true. Routine treatment given to people with any bite (dog, insect or human) has always been for staphylococcus. These antibiotics (flucloxacillin, fusidic acid etc) worked well on most people.
In medical literatures there have been various reports about MRSA colonizing in pets and pass then on to their owners. Since 1980’s this bug has developed resistance and doctors are struggling to find alternate ways to treat.
I sincerely hope Andre will respond to high dose of antibiotic and get well soon.
Hi. I have a real problem here and I’ve been looking around for anyone who can help or knows much about this, because the doctors here don’t seem to. I already knew about the “brown recluse” myth years ago; because I once worked for the vector control department out here. Anyway– I’ve never been one to be afraid of spiders. I actually like them, and encourage people not to kill them as they so often seem to want to do.
But this is really getting really serious real quick. My boyfriend has MRSA now, and after several doctors visits, X-rays, MRI’s, 3 days in the hospital, 2 debridements, and now a PICC line inserted into his heart to deliver the full strength of anti-biotic possible, they still have been unable to determine the origin of the wound itself. I am pretty darn sure it was a “desert recluse”, or some related species, and I’m not thinking this out of ignorance.. I’m thinking because we found the web, and saw the spider herself later but she was too quick for us to catch. We took a photo of her but it isn’t that good; it doesn’t show how strangely colored she was. Almost reminded me of a White Widow, if there could be such a thing. (We have a lot of widows out here, so we’re sure she wasn’t that). The thing that particularly strikes me in the description is the web-style: I have seen a lot of webs before and never one like this, it was very erratic and haphazard-looking.
So anyway, I’m not sure how much it can help, but I still would like to know. The doctors immediately dismissed our spider theory, though it is the best evidence we have so far… as described, he never felt any pain whenever it happened (he fell asleep outside in the hammock one afternoon, and we’re pretty sure that’s when it was). I can send you a pic if you want to check it out. I am just really freaking worried , because I just read on Wikipedia that MRSA has a 34% mortality rate, so, this is Not Good. Any advice you have or where to look would be most helpful- me & Andre thank you– Rhonda.
Dr Kadiyali M Srivatsa:
I have a question in regards to your response. If my daughter had contracted MRSA through the use of a venous catheter, why did she not get the infection in her blood? Why is she infected inside of her vagina?
The IV was ran in her left hand. Her initial infection began 4 days after having the IV. She woke up in the morning with TONS of dark yellow vaginal discharge. It was either later that evening (or the following evening) that she got the “spider bite” bumps on her labia. The next day, I noticed (2) more red bumps on the back of each leg (about 4 inches below her buttocks)…. and the day after that was when she developed yet another red bump on her left arm.
I am 100% POSITIVE that she acquired MRSA through the emergency room that day. The doctors are all disagreeing with me because of the “site” of her MRSA infection. I have been told, “For all we know, she could have picked it up off a toilet seat in public and been colonized with it for a very long time.” I know that’s NOT TRUE!
February 17th was her last dose of Cipro. I have since been continuing the Mupirocin ointment. Her labia is still “pink”. Her infectious disease dr decided not to reculture her. She said that the culture is MORE THAN LIKELY positive considering the MRSA location. She said if my daughter continues to get “outbreaks”, they will continue to treat with Cipro and possible run rifampin along with it.
I gave her a bath tonight. When I went to apply the Mupirocin, she complained of pain inside her vagina. I gently spread her labia a bit and took a look. She does have SOME (not much) discharge again… and I also noticed a spot inside that is RED RED RED again. I touched the red spot and she cried!!! I then touched a spot (with a different finger tip) and she said that doesn’t hurt at all there. I put a little more Mupirocin on my glove and applied it to the VERY red area. (The area is right AT the vaginal opening). She screamed in pain when I applied it there!
I feel like I am getting no where with these doctors. Unfortunately, they are the only pediatric infectious disease doctors in this area. Everyone trusts Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.
What should I do? Please help!! Please give me more advice. I am so afraid of what this may turn into.
Thank you,
Kim
Kim’s letter, points out the problem of managing and highlight difficulties encountered by parents. As doctors we must learn to respect parents and patients concern and be open to accept their opinion.
Temporary central vascular or peripheral catheters are placed in an ever-increasing percentage of hospitalized patients. Venous catheter commonly placed for ease of obtaining blood and to save time in restarting peripheral venous catheters-a practice that should be discouraged. Introducing cannula is often not an easy procedure and multiple punctures used will producing puncture wounds in the skin for organism to enter bloodstream.
Antibiotics once started should theoretically produce good response after 3 doses are given. We as doctors must be aware of bacteria (HA-MRSA, CA-MRSA, E Coli, Clostridiums & Candida) are resistant to antibiotic. Bactrim (Septrin) is often now used in this situation but doctors must be aware this could produce reaction and may not be the best choice for MRSA. Swabs for culture and sensitivity must be organised before starting an antibiotic and not after 7 days of treatment.
Antibiotic in lower dose are often bacteriostatic (stop bacteria multiplying) and in adequate dose are bactericidal (Kill bugs). I feel there is no need to continue using antibiotic for as long as 10 days without proper discussion with microbiologist and the parents. This bacteria is new and most are now resistant to vancomycin. Trying to kill the bacteria with high dose antibiotic is also subjected to debate because the bug release toxins and enzymes which can kill in 12-24 Hours.
Looking for some advice PLEASE!
My 4 yr old daughter was feeling under the weather (so to speak). We went to the ER where she had blood work drawn through and IV. All test came back ok and we were told she only has a virus. They took the IV out after about 4-5 hours and sent us home.
4 days later, she woke up with HORRIBLE vaginal discharge. Since she was on Amoxicillan for an ear infection, the dr. said it was just a yeast infection. She was treated with Diflucan and a vaginal culture was done. Later that evening, she had a few marks on her inner upper thigh and labia that appeared to be “spider bites”. Next day, she woke up with those same marks on the back of each leg. 2 days later, she had one on her arm. I was planning to take her to the dr the next day to get them looked at.
Well, the dr. called before I had the chance to get her looked at. Her vaginal culture came back as “Heavy Growth MRSA”. It is resistant to Clyndamicyn & Erythomycin (sp?). So, they started her on Bactrim.
On day 7 of Bactrim, she had a horrible skin reaction. The Bactrim was stopped and we were given Cirpo. They also cultured her again. (If the culture came back neg. we were to stop the Cipro.)
The culture indeed came back negative. I was told by one dr in the practice to stop the Cipro… and told to continue it for 10 days by another. I chose to continue it. On day 8 of Cipro, I missed 2 doses. The MRSA on her skin immediately got “redder”. I gave the cipro and it went back to “pinkish” again.
I went to see another dr the next day. I told him what happened and he has her on the CIPRO for another 10 days!!!!!
Question…. Should I demand she be started on the Vanco or what??? She still has the “pinkish” areas on her labia.. and some reddish abcesses (sp?) on her inner upper thigh.
Note: I have 4 children and they are all being exposed to this because the darn doctors won’t give her the vanco and call it a day!!! I know that is what it is going to come down to. (My pharmacist also agrees with me.)
I have been reading about MRSA which has shown up in schools and other locations in Jacksonville. It states that people confuse MRSA with spider bites sometimes. My husband went to the doctor who said he thought it was a cyst and to put a heating pad on it which was done. He also gave him antibiotics. But this has a fever in it still and is hard and red, also itches at times and is still painful. I still think it’s a bite. He’s to go back to the doctor Friday if not better.
Helen Harris’s information about using central venous line catheter and increasing chances of survival is not correct. Various antibiotic including minocycline and rifampin are used but its efficiency needs to be established.
I hope someone discovers a suitable antibiotic soon. Doctors believe bacteriostatic (stop growth and multiplication) approach is better because bactericidal (kill) treatment will result in patients dying due to toxins released by the organism. Scientists have identified eight toxins and some six enzymes which are lethal.
We were concerned about the tremendous volume of disposable plastic devices being disposed of on a daily basis and are keen to develop ways to minimise this. Bacteria colonize in blood and body secretions, discarded blood collected in tubes and needles are placed in yellow box (sharp container, hospital waste). These organisams are air bound and multiply rapidly and is likely to move out to colonize in hospital. Bacteria are present on the skin of patients which are often introduced into circulation resulting in systemic infection and death.
The risk factors assessed by NHS in UK clearly document most common cause for spreading antibiotic resistant strain of bacteria are Intravascualr Device as Number 1 risk factor of systemic infection (H-MRSA & CA-MRSA) and Urinary catheters for entrococci (C-Diff & E-Coli)
We noticed increased infection rate (MRSA) in babies who were difficult to cannulate (introduce IV Device). Variuos studies conducted in hospitals, published in medical journals pinpoitn this device as a major risk factor.
Cannula and catheter are not safe to patients because the number of attempts taken to introduce IV Device is unlikly to reduce. Adequate preparation of skin prior to introducing 2nd cannulae can be poor as doctors must spend 1-2 minutes of drying time. Doctors and nurses introduce IV Device in the first attempt in only 60% of patients and after 2-3 years of experience they may be sucessful in only 90% of patients. This coupled with colonization of MRSA on hands and poor sterlization and asepsis when introducing a cannula is likly to increase invasive CA-MRSA.
I’d like to encourage every person to watch practical procedures performed in hospitals (even taking blood for blood test) to protect themselves. Once the bug enters your blood circulation, the infection will spread in your body like a wild fire.
I was diagnosed with MRSA about 4-5 months ago. My first out break started after I unintentionally scratched open what at the time looked like a boil. The site of the cut began to swell, harden and turned red. I went to my doctor and he prescribed an antibiotic named Cephalexin, which did next to nothing. Within a few days the original site had tripled in size so I scheduled another appointment. I was disturbed that my doctor did not take a culture to ascertain what I had and instead referred me to the surgical dept. where they employed the good ol’ fashion “bleed and purge” procedure which left me with a wound that I had to pack with gauzes for a week (not fun). At that point I was prescribed with yet another antibiotic, Sulfamethoxazole. That worked well and I did not have another outbreak for a few months. But now I have another outbreak on my calf which is starting to grow as well as several other pus-bumps on that same leg. I am tired of doctors shoveling pill after pill in my face with next to no results. Antibiotics are definitely overused in this country. They hamper the bodies own natural defenses, kill off the good bacteria and allow the bad bacteria that survive to thrive and grow more resistant. Western medicines reliance on antibiotics has created an artificial bubble that is certain to burst and I fear that we are ill equipped to handle the effects.
I work in a Nursing Home so would love any and all information on this. Thank you, Marianne
This is obviously serious stuff, it’s scary reading all of these experiences. We are waiting, patiently, on my son’s culture results. His sore has not gotten any bigger, but hasn’t really improved either.
It’s still small, like a pea, so even if it is MRSA, we’ll be glad we caught it fast.
On another note, I am concerned for those in this world who overuse antibacterial soaps all the time and hand sanitizer’s. The media and advertisers make it look as though we should use it all the time, but think about the good bacteria you are killing along with the bad! When we kill off the good bacteria, it allows the bad bacteria to come back stronger, and we have less good bacteria to fight it. Sound familiar, like the over prescribed antibiotics causing things like MRSA to develop into hard to treat diseases.
At the same time, I’m caught in the middle not sure what to do. In this case, since MRSA can be so serious, and we’re talking about my child- I will take the medical approach, but hopefully the results will be negative.
Aug 21st 07 I noticed a what I thought to be a bite and it got swollen but I did not think to much about just because I have kind of an allergic reaction to even a wasp sting. By the end of the night on the 22nd my face was swollen to where it looked like I had a tennis ball in my cheek and my jaw went numb and that is when i decided to go to the ER.
They took samples and what not and told me what I had and they were not very nice about it at all. They started an IV and then I got about 5 needles in the face I was in the hospital aprox 8 hours they sent me home with more antibiotics and told me to call the surgeon the next morning.
My face continued to be huge on one side and I went to see him. The way people looked at me scared me because I could tell that it was bad, just by the look on there faces . The surgeon came in and said I wont work on you, you have to act and he called a plastic surgeon! I was not worried about the scar, I was more worried about not being there for my kids.
Good thanks to my plastic surgeon whom did a very well job I have another laugh line that is what I say. Having this has opened my eyes so much, I get sicker easier now which doctors say It might take a little bit to get everything back to normal.
Bleach and antibacterial spray are my best friends!
In April of this year I found what I thought was a small bite or razor bump on my leg that had a little head on it and I scratched it off thinking nothing of it. By 5pm the area was red (about the size of a 50 cent piece) and hurt like a major sunburn if touched. By 6am the following morning the redness which was now also swelling was the size of my hand and it was very difficult to walk.
It continued to get worse so I drove myself to an urgent care center at around 3 pm and the doctor immediately made an incision about 1 in long and 1 1/2 inches deep to drain the infection and started me on IV antibiotics. I was told that if I had waited even another 24 hours at the rate the infection was spreading I would have lost my leg.
He would have liked to hospitalize me but I had no health insurance which by the end of this ordeal ran me about $3,000 with a cash pay discount. It continued to spread from about halfway down the top of my upper thigh to almost the whole length of my calf before it started to get better which took about 5 days to see improvement.
I had to return to the UC daily for 7 days for IV antibiotics and to get the packing changed in my incision ( OMG I almost threw up every time they did it, it hurt so bad) which I had to do for 14 days total along with oral antibiotics. I have had at least one MRSA blister a month since that time and have learned (BY TRIAL AND ERROR) that by NOT scratching it off and just covering it with a bandaid and triple antibiotic ointment and cleaning with alcohol that it will turn into what looks like a big water blister and drain on its own without any need for oral meds.
It turns out that my boyfriend at the time who was constantly getting what we thought were blackwidow bites and taking trips to a different urgent care was actually getting MRSA infections resulting in me getting them. The doctors were very fast to diagnose these as spider bites but no one else had ever gotten bitten or seen these so called spiders that were having him for lunch.
At first I thought I was bitten by some kind of spider, but began to wonder about it! I started working a part time job in June 2007 at our local Wal-Mart store in the TLE Department (Tire Lube Express).
After being there for about a month I began to notice what looked like pimples on my left and right forearms. I thought nothing of it, until the following day when they began to inch horribly. I scratched and scratched, and finally decided to pop them and squeeze out the pus.
Over the next couple of days they began to swell. A large reddish area surrounded a tiny blackish circle on both arms. They next day the pain was so horrible, I went to the local clinic and say a doctor. He prescribed AVELOX which is a strong antibiotic, for a 7 day period. He dismissed the spider bite theory and indicated it was probably MRSA.
After about three week the wounds healed, but several days later I got yet another large wound on my left knee and went back to doctor again. He had me squeeze out some pus and sent it off for culture testing and put me backon AVELOX again this time for 14 days. The results came back positve for MRSA.
Does this mean I am infected for life? Will this ever go away? I am currently taking TURMERIC CAPSULES daily, as I ready it was a healthy home remedy! As well TEA TREE OIL which is a natural antiseptic from Autralia, works well to aid in wound healing! Ever here about that!
Now my wife has MRSA from exposure on her job working with kids as a Arts Teacher. Can I re-catch it from her?
My daughter who is 2 has what appears to be a pimple on her chin. It does have the pus filled head as most pimples do. This is not bothering her in any way however, I am a very paranoid person. Should this cause me any concern? Or is this just what it looks like…. a pimple?
washing the hands makes sense but washing the nose with hypertonic saline makes even more sense. we know that washing the body’s filter emoves bacteria, shrinks swollen membranes and feels good. why not wash?
Me and a friend have been getting these “bites”…welll what we think are bites… the symptoms are close to what some of you have been describeing.i’ve beeen tot he doctors and they perscribed a antibiotic….cuople of weeks later i got another “bite”..along with my friend…
I had what I thought was a spider bite that itched like mad . I went to the Doctor on the 2nd day because it had gotten hard red, and very swollen , She gave me some meds and sent me home , after drawing a line around the redness. The next day the redness had spread I called and was told to come back . She then gave me two shots of a very potent antibiotic,, Went home again . the next morning when I awoke . The red had spread yet further out . and the center was starting to turn black . by the time I got to the Doctors office there were two blister like areas over the black spots, one of which had popped and drained bloody pus. The doctor did a culture and placed me into the hospital.
She didn’t mention MRSA to me or even tell me that she was chekcing me for it. So there I sat in the hospital for two days on iv antibiotics . which seemed to be taking the redness away. All the while i had visitors and took a shower in the shared showeroom. The 3rd day the Doctor told me I had MRSA and they switched my iv to vancomyicin. I was released the next day. And sent home with more meds.
Within like a week my 18 month old daughter had a suspicious boil on her back that was extremely red and swollen , they did a test on her and found she too had mrsa. ( Not surprised because she crawled all over me in my hospital bed and she has contact dermatits (very bad skin rash) She did not have to be treated with vanco. However she had to take a horrid smelling /tasting med 4 times a day for 10 days.
which ment i had to wake her up in the night to give it to her..
i think you should treat any suspicious wound as if you had mrsa. keep it covered, wash your hands ALL the time and keep bedding clean . to avoid spreading it . had I been aware of the dangers my daughter might not have it today .
It’s true you can never completely get rid of it . You can heal the wounds but you will always be a carrier if you’ve had it . and the chances of it affecting you again are higher. MRSA can be deadly.It can be far worse than just a spider like biten infection. ( sometimes infecting joints, lungs, heart) It is nothing to mess around with , and you should do everything you can to not contact it . WASH HANDS all the time .
Also they say it lives mainly in your nostrils , so no picking your nose..
and just figure if someone that does have it picks their nose at say the supermarket then touches a can of peas, then you touch that can of peas.. you have it through cross contamination , now if you have any wounds , bites etc, and you touch them before washing your hands .. look out !!!!
So I thought i had initially been bitten by something, felt sick for a couple of weeks and finally the pain had gotten SO bad that my roommate took me to the ER. That is the last I remember for like 6 weeks. My temp spiked to 105, i was transferred to ICU and had to be put on life support for 4.5 weeks. After multiple tests, they finally figured out I had MRSA septicemia and it infiltrated my heart, lungs, eyes and brain. After a lengthy stint in the hospital that rendered me bankrupt I am MRSA free and fortunately after long term IV antibiotics and multiple surgeries ( 4 retinal surgeries, tracheotomy, tons of invasive cultures and a subsequent gall bladder removal-thank long term IV anti bx for that) I am only blind in one eye, and my lungs, heart and brain are good. This was not quite 2 years ago and while I once thought, at then 27, my life was ruined, I now realize its only changed… I to this day do not know how i got MRSA but I know that it is no joke.
On August 25, 2007 I assume I was bitten by a Brown Recluse Spider. At first I thought it was a pimple/mosquito bite under my left eyebrow, so I popped it Saturday night. On Sunday there was a “swollen” area that I applied hot tea bags to (dumb move). On Monday I went to work and no longer used the hot compresses. By 3pm on Monday the eyelid began to swell and fill up. I went home Monday evening and applied more hot compresses (washcloths – ran out of tea bags). At bed time I applied “drawing salve” (been through the brown recluse thing before in high school; 16 years earlier) and covered it with a bandaid. Tuesday morning I woke up with a swollen shut left eye and left cheek down to my lips and over to my ear. But…when I took the bandaid off, the site began to drain.
I went to the Doctor’s Tuesday pm and she prescribed Cipro. I saw her again on Wednesday and she admitted me to the hospital for IV antibiotics. Wednesday we found out that I am allergic to Vancomyacin and the Infectious Diseases Doctor put me on IV Zyvox. The site continued to drain at a very slow pace and by Thursday some of the swelling had gone away. Thursday night my nurse (the genius that he was) nuked 4 washcloths as hot as he could get them and proceeded to wrap them in pillow cases for insulation. I was able to keep this compress on my eye for over an hour, peeling away the layers as they cooled. I could actually feel the infection pulling to the surface as we did this and over the night.
On Friday morning I woke up to a scab on the site that come off with normal washing. When it came off, a black/green core pulled out of it and the drainage almost stopped at that point. I was released from the hospital that following Saturday and was sent home on 7 days worth of the Zyvox, which by the way is horrible and leaves an awful taste in the mouth and comes w/major diet restrictions (heed the diet restriction, eating some of the forbidden food will REALLY give you a headache).
At almost my one month mark from follow up appointment I am still MRSA free. I haven’t had a relapse but found out that my Dr’s are seeing a lot of MRSA cases in spider bites. It is only their belief that they think some types of spiders (those that are necrotic) will pass the staph infection on to its victim.
Hope anyone reading this is checked out if they think they have some sort of spider bite. Fast, aggressive, and good treatment were what saved my eye.
My daughters have both had MRSA a few times. I have, what I would consider to be a very clean house (pinesol & bleach).
What is the gestation period for the MRSA?
For instance, if it ‘lives’ in your blood stream for say 3 years, would that be 3 years from the last attack or first?
What can I do at home to be better?
Kids carry instant hand sanitizers now, but still have gotten them.
They are so painful, it hurts me to see them suffer and cry. I am from Mohave Valley, AZ; where CA, NV, AZ all meet, on the Colorado River. It’s been my understanding that MRSA is near epidemic in the high school here, gym equipment and kids being fearless kids, but what can the schools do to get a handle on this?
Gratefully,
Suzie
I have a bite I didn’t even feel. Only when I caught an itch, that’s when I found it on my stomach. It was a red circle with a very small pus bump in the center of it. I busted it about 3 times from scratching it and the bump came back each time. I treated it with alcohol to help with the itching 3 days ago, now I have whips big and small coming from it and its spreading like a rash. Even when I don’t bother it all day, it severely itches and I worry about MRSA.
About 3 weeks ago it seemed like I had a cold sore starting within a week I had what looked like impetigo on the side of my face down to my chin at this time my daughter had what looked like a spider bite on her leg which in 2 days inflamed 3 times the size she also had what looked like a sty we both went into the Dr at that time they didn’t do much at all we were prescribed Fucidin ointment, Took a swab of my face and sent home.
My daughters leg seemed to heal up nice in a couple days but I did not. About 5 days later I get a call from the Dr office says that they needed to see me. When I went in I was told I have MRSA (which I have never heard of before) I was not prescribed anything eles at the time.
About 3 days later I woke up my nose, throat were just so sore , I was wizzy and It was starting to get hard for me to breathe right I had some uncomfortable sensation under my left breast felt almost like some one was pushing really hard. I went up to the emergency ward in which no tests were taking, I was given APO-SULFATRIM DS ( double dose ) and sent home, So far the sores on my face look like they are healing but my body is achng like crazy and i’m still short of breath at times I can not even walk up my stair without feeling like the wind was knocked out of me.
I am also not to sure what to expect from this.
I’ve recently been diagnosed with MRSA on what i thought was poison ivy on my rear, not the wounds have all healed except for 1 or 2, but i have been having alot of stiffness and sharp pains through my hips and legs making it difficult to walk and move. Can this be due to the MRSA?
I would appreciate any information on this. I keep getting more scared everytime I read more and more, I’m just not sure what to expect.
Hello all. I work at a hospital where I come in contact with MRSA all the time. Indeed it is very contagious and you should make sure not to touch your wound or wounds when you have it. Not only can it be in your wounds but in your Nares and urine too. Most people with good immune systems like my self may carry MRSA but experiance no signs or symtoms. Elderly and children are extreamly vulnarabul to this infection. Its not true that it is not curable I see patients beat it all the time, but remeber once you had MRSA you are more than likely to get it again. The second go round or thrid and so on may be harder to treat because it is a drug resistant infection. Im not a doctor and am not claming to be one. Im just a Nurse.
ive been bitten by what we call a desert recluse it resembles the brown recluse bit or mrsa wound in the same way it was on my leg it ate throw my muscle so deep that if i had waited another day to go in i would of lost my leg . they cleaned the bite and did everything right but i got mrsa from getting the bite it is uncurable so ive heard but there are pill for the red bumps it leaves on your skin and i got both form the spider bite . what they wont tell you is that mrsa was created ina hospital and is immuned to most medications but is easily passed
I would deeply appreciate any feedback on my possible spider bite that I posted earlier!
Thank you,
Denise Arens
The area is getting larger than when i sent the first report of possibly being bitten by a spider. It has doubled in size and is not bothering my lower part of my leg.
Denise Arens
My husband had a bump, what we thought was a heat bump, on the side of his calf. He picked it and the next day went to the doctor saying it hurt so bad and gotten much worse. The doctor said steph infection and started Bactrim antibiotics. It got the size of a golf ball and split the skin before he returned to the doctor to have him lance it. Its been 9 days and still looks bad but better. Still not sure if steph, MRSA or spider bite, culture was done but no results as of yet.
I woke up one morning with what looked like a bite from a spider on my upper back thigh but I don’t have spiders. I went to the doctor that weekend, we figured it was MRSA and got on prednisone and bactrim.
I was scared because later the following week I had to go to the hospital to get it drained and had to stay because my white blood cells were high. I ended up staying five days and was put on zyvox for two weeks.
Weeks later I get Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus aureus again with several different out breaks on my legs. Now I am on zyvox again a month and a half later with now back and chest pain, shortness of breath and it is not my asthma.
I am a 33 year old with five kids 16,13,11,8,3 I hope not to go through this again. GET CHECKED QUICK like I did.
I just wanted to share that I was bitten by a brown and ended up with MRSA. It took nine surgeries and has ruined my life. Please, if are bitten, seek medical attention!
I think I have had MRSA for a month or 2 . I started having shortness of breath and chest pain and assumed it was my asthma.
Last week I woke up with a itchy,red bump on my buttock. It itched and there was a red ring around the area. We have spiders really bad in our house and I assumed one got me while I slept. The next day the whole area was swollen hard and it was very painful. I didnt feel ill at all but I knew something wasn’t right.
The sore got bigger and more red and finally it burst. Today I am worried because it looks like there was a big black hole in my skin. I think I did get bit my a spider and it just gave me MRSA. I was practically forced to go to the ER some of my freinds had the same thing and said it was “just spiders” . I’ve never heard of this and its common so my advice is get it checked out before it leads to something that cannot be fixed.
A year and a half ago I got bit by a spider( we got the spider) my leg had gotten red around the site. The doctor said that if it got any worse to go to the hospital. Two hours later my leg was swollen from my knee to my ankle. I was lanced (cut) open and the bite area was tested and found that the spider had given me MRSA; now I am really afraid of spiders. I also work in the health field and I know not to mess around.
My 17yr old son has what he thinks is a spider bite, he said all his friends have it too. I have searched the web to do some research on staph infections because that what I belive it is. To my surprise they are alot alike, but the treatment for one is opposite the other (besides the meds.)
One says to cut it open and drain it while the other says not to. So what I’m wondering is, if you did not see yourself get bit how does the doctor know which one it is ??????
Hi, I had what you call MRSA. My mom thinks that I had it for a while and we thought that they were just spider bites. But then once I got a big one on the back of my leg and we went to the doctor. It hurt really badly but we finally named him…Guss.
So, if you get something that looks like a spider bite, go to your doctor right away please, it may be Methicillin Resistant Staphylococcus Aureus.
I had a bit of some kind on the back of my calf. It is about the size of a quater and has a small pus pimle in the middle. The surrounding area is red and irritated and itches. I busted the pimple and it slowly started to heal leaving a dark area where the lesion was.
In addition I have another similar lesion on the opposite leg and the area became red, irritated and itches. I busted this lesion also and the only signs that remain are a shadow of the irritated area and a small head of a pin size scab in the middle of the lesion.
I want to know if this is a spider bit of some kind. I live in a newly constructed home and see a lot of critters, among them small black and brown spiders.
I personally came face to face with a near deadly MRSA infection… 6 weeks after the birth of my 3rd baby boy. I had a couple of sores on my face that didn’t seem to be getting better for weeks and one in particular on my forehead right at my hairline that caused severe pain in the area along with a really bad headache. The skin in the area eventually turned black. I really didn’t get alarmed because I thought if I cleaned it and went to the doctor for anitbiotics, then I would be fine.
I woke up one morning and didn’t feel well. I had a fever of about 102 and a severe headache. I took some ibuprofen and went about my day. By that evening, my chest had started hurting really badly, and my breathing became very shallow. I layed down for bed, but quickly sat up because I was unable to breathe.
I took my temp. and it was over 104. I told my husband that I needed to go to the ER, but he didn’t think it was that serious at the time. By morning (about 6 am) I could no longer take the pain, so we took our older children to daycare and brought our newborn with us to the hospital. To make a long story shorter, the general procedures and tests were ran, and my ct scan came back showing several lesions and tumors in both of my lungs.
I ended up in that hospital for 2 weeks, went home on home healthcare with a permanent IV feed in my arm to receive Vancomycin antibiotics at home. I became ill again after a week at home and went back into a different hospital.
Turns out I became allergic to the Vancomycin and it was becoming toxic in my blood which is actually what was causing me to become ill again…
Needless to say, MRSA is nothing to mess around with and if you suspect a staph infection of any type, you should seek treatment immediately!!!
You can also get MRSA through a central venous line catheter. Your chances of survival will increase if the hospital uses a CVL with the antiobiodic of minocycline and rifampin.