This is the first I’ve heard of cauterizing a snakebite in an effort to destroy the venom.
I am familiar with the idea of cauterizing wounds, especially from the cowboy days as Cecil mentions, but that is an effort to kill any infections present. Cauterization would apply to any wounds, such as gunshots.
Also, while if I am in an urban/suburban setting, or even a rural community, then simply having the person relax and getting to a hospital quickly makes sense. What if we’re on, say, a hiking trip in the woods, where we’ve hiked an hour off the path? Now the person has to traverse/exert energy to get to help, and have some time delay before reaching medical attention. I would think reducing the amount of venom by 50% would be a benefit.
Cecil also says
Well, yeah, because that’s when sulfa drugs and antibiotics became available. You know, methods of treating the infection rather than just burn it out or cut it off.
In helping Cecil look up alternative remedies through history for snakebite, I came across one interesting one, which didn’t make it into the column: plantain. Apparently, the efficacy of plantain was proven by a long-winded story involving a Virginia slave watching a lengthy mortal combat between a toad and a spider.
(I guess that before television was invented, that was considered to be quality entertainment.)
The most creative one of all involved using either a chicken or a toad, freshly killed and cut lengthwise, slapped onto the wound like a grisly Band-Aid straight out of an Hieronymus Bosch painting.
I’m reminded of the young woman who was told that gelatin would help her grow strong fingernails. After a month she was apparently seeing no benefit and asked how long she was supposed to soak her fingers in the goop before it would have an impact.
Of course, she was supposed to EAT it and not soak in it.
So, my question is… how does one USE the plantain? (My first thought was that one could use it to club the little beast that bit ya.)
According to the reference I have, you were supposed to use the juice of the leaves (the toad nibbled the leaf every time it was bitten by the spider). The reference further claims that if you cover a rattlesnake with plantain leaves it will die, and that binding plantain leaves around your ankles will scare off rattlesnakes.
Allen, John W. Legends and Lore of Southern Illinois Southern Illinois University Press, 1963.
I was always taught that tourniquets were bad, but that a pressure bandage wrapped around the limb above the bite was very helpful.
The theory is that a lot of poison transport is via the lymph system so compression will slow lymph flow, but not blood flow.
The tourniquet disadvantage is that when it’s released there is a sudden flow of highly envenomed blood.
Seeing as I was in a couple of very high risk groups for snake bites (military and orienteering) and I did actually get into physical contact with snakes on occasions, I was very attentive to first-aid training.