MIAMI HERALD (Florida) 29 June 11 Slowing Down Snake Venom (Sammy Mack)

Victims of venomous snake bites might soon be getting the gift of time.

A new study out this week in the journal Nature Medicine shows a treatment traditionally used in heart patients can slow the speed of snake venom hitting the blood stream.

The eastern coral snake is one of six venomous snakes indigenous to Florida. (Image: John Edwards Holbrook)

Australian researchers applied an ointment with nitric oxide around snake bite areas on mice. The mice that got the ointment lived 50% longer than the control mice.

Then human subjects were injected with a dye that simulates venom. Without the ointment, it took about 13 minutes for the dye to travel from the foot to the groin. With the ointment, the process slowed down to about 54 minutes. That quadruples the amount of time before the venom hits the blood stream.

“If you’re in a remote area it gives you time to get in contact with somebody,” says Captain Jeffrey Fobb of the Miami-Dade Fire Rescue Venom Response Program.

Fobb’s department maintains the country’s only antivenom bank. The Florida Department of Health doesn’t have statewide numbers, but Miami’s antivenom unit responds to about 100 calls in South Florida every year.

But don’t go antagonizing your venomous snakes just yet.

Fobb points Florida’s snakes are a little different from the Australian varieties. The venom in Florida snakes tends to cause tissue death. It’s one of the reasons snake bites sometimes lead to amputations. It’s not clear yet from the study if slowing down the the process will cause tissue-killing venom to pool in one area and do greater damage.

“It may not benefit us,” says Fobb. “If it was the case of life over limb, then perhaps it would.”

Fobb also points out that the best way to prevent a bad snake bite is to keep your distance from snakes.
Slowing Down Snake Venom

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