Nathan Halliday, a 34-year-old man from Kirkby, UK, was holding his pet hamster Mochi when the animal suffered a seizure and bit down on his hand.
However the actual hassle began only a few minutes after when he started struggling the telltale signs of anaphylaxis, a extreme life-threatening response. All of a sudden, he developed issue respiration, and his entire physique swelled and was coated in hives.
Fortunately, his accomplice reacted rapidly and known as emergency providers.
Mentioned Halliday:
It was completely horrendous particularly as I had no thought a hamster chunk might trigger one thing like this.
My entire physique felt swollen and my throat damage – I couldn’t even communicate and it was like respiration via a straw. I used to be coated in hives.
No person had ever heard of what had occurred earlier than. It amused the medical doctors however they had been very skilled about it.
They gave me epi pens for the following time a hamster desires to take me on.
All jokes apart, the expertise was actually very scary.
A 2023 research revealed within the journal Allergol Choose concludes:
Anaphylaxis from animal bites isn’t reported with solely roughly 40 instances described within the English language literature. Nevertheless, anaphylaxis happens extra steadily than steered by revealed case reviews and needs to be thought of in a symptomatic affected person following a chunk.
Halliday described the circumstances main as much as the chunk:
I sat with Mochi in my arms for an hour and a half whereas she slept.
She rested her arms on my thumb and instantly she bit proper via my hand.
She clamped down and wouldn’t let go – I believe from having a seizure – and my accomplice Rebecca needed to pry her off me.
As soon as we’d acquired her off, she took a few breaths and died.
Simply a few minutes afterwards, I began to get a bit itchy.
Halliday, who’s asthmatic, took a couple of puffs of his inhaler and realized one thing was incorrect.
He continued his story:
We’ve acquired an oxygen meter and the degrees had dropped to 84%. It was like my entire physique had swollen and was all tight so we dialled 999 [emergency services].
I couldn’t breathe. My throat had swollen and I used to be coated in hives on my again, chest and arms.
I’ve been bitten by hamsters prior to now and nothing like this has ever occurred. It was fairly scary.
An ambulance arrived inside 4 minutes, and he was rushed to Aintree College Hospital, the place he was administered oxygen and two photographs of epinephrine, in addition to an antihistamine and a tetanus shot.
He mentioned:
I used to be undoubtedly the dullest man in main trauma. I did attempt to change the story to a scorpion however I believe the paramedics most well-liked hamster.
Mochi is now in a elaborate cracker field within the backyard – I don’t blame her.
We rescue hamsters from individuals who in any other case wouldn’t need them and I’d by no means say no to a different one.
