Minoriteeburg
26-02-2006, 21:10
Maggots strike blow for amputees and diabetics
26 February 2006
By DEIDRE MUSSEN
http://www.amonline.net.au/insects/images/insects/250/instar_3.jpg
A wriggling pile of stomach-churning maggots feast on a Christchurch Hospital patient's necrotic foot wound - but he's happy about it because the fly larvae may save his right leg from amputation.
"Some people can't get their head around it," the 55-year-old Christchurch businessman says. "But I'm happy to be the guinea pig. It's going to help me and it's going to help other people."
Maggot debridement therapy is regaining popularity around the world as a non-surgical way of cleaning chronic wounds.
The maggots secrete enzymes to liquidise dead tissue before eating it, eventually exposing healthy tissue.
The treatment has been used only a few times in New Zealand, and is a first for Christchurch, but there are now moves to introduce maggot therapy to Auckland.
The Christchurch patient, who declined to be named, said squeamish feelings stopped him looking at the maggots at first, but his curiosity eventually got too much.
"It's quite fascinating to see them racing around in there - they cause quite a stir."
He describes the sensation as like a moth flying into your ear - a fluttery fuzzy feeling.
Humour abounds as the man's wound dressing is changed and fat maggots pour out of his wound on to the sheet below.
"My wife moved out of the matrimonial bed because she was worried they would escape," he laughs.
The hospital's hyperbaric unit clinical charge nurse, Marj van der Linden, carefully puts the tiny maggots on to his wound, caging them with taped-down gauze.
Every couple of days, the full maggots are replaced by baby maggots the size of a grain of salt.
She said the man's wound had greatly improved after two applications of about 60 maggots over the past fortnight. The third batch was put in on Friday.
The man's doctor, vascular surgeon David Lewis, used maggots with huge success to treat wounds during his surgical training in the UK 10 years ago.
The treatment goes back to the Napoleonic wars in the early 1800s, when maggot-infested wounds were found to heal better than those without maggots. The same was found in World War I.
Lewis said suitable candidates were patients with poor circulation or wounds which were slow to heal.
"It's possibly going to lower the amputation rate and will allow patients a speedier recovery and limb function," he said.
"Rather than losing two toes, they might lose only one."
The Christchurch patient was diabetic and had his big right toe amputated in December. He was one day away from having his leg amputated when doctors decided to try other measures, including maggot therapy.
The maggots come from entomologist Dallas Bishop, who rears the European green blowfly maggots at the Wallaceville research centre in Upper Hutt.
Diabetes specialist podiatrist Angela Bayley plans to introduce maggot therapy at a new diabetes health service for Maori, starting in Auckland in April.
About 515 people a year lose a leg in New Zealand because of complications related to diabetes.
Sounds disgusting, but if it would save me from losing any limbs i'd sign up for this in a heartbeat. Would anyone else care to partake in some maggot cleansing?
26 February 2006
By DEIDRE MUSSEN
http://www.amonline.net.au/insects/images/insects/250/instar_3.jpg
A wriggling pile of stomach-churning maggots feast on a Christchurch Hospital patient's necrotic foot wound - but he's happy about it because the fly larvae may save his right leg from amputation.
"Some people can't get their head around it," the 55-year-old Christchurch businessman says. "But I'm happy to be the guinea pig. It's going to help me and it's going to help other people."
Maggot debridement therapy is regaining popularity around the world as a non-surgical way of cleaning chronic wounds.
The maggots secrete enzymes to liquidise dead tissue before eating it, eventually exposing healthy tissue.
The treatment has been used only a few times in New Zealand, and is a first for Christchurch, but there are now moves to introduce maggot therapy to Auckland.
The Christchurch patient, who declined to be named, said squeamish feelings stopped him looking at the maggots at first, but his curiosity eventually got too much.
"It's quite fascinating to see them racing around in there - they cause quite a stir."
He describes the sensation as like a moth flying into your ear - a fluttery fuzzy feeling.
Humour abounds as the man's wound dressing is changed and fat maggots pour out of his wound on to the sheet below.
"My wife moved out of the matrimonial bed because she was worried they would escape," he laughs.
The hospital's hyperbaric unit clinical charge nurse, Marj van der Linden, carefully puts the tiny maggots on to his wound, caging them with taped-down gauze.
Every couple of days, the full maggots are replaced by baby maggots the size of a grain of salt.
She said the man's wound had greatly improved after two applications of about 60 maggots over the past fortnight. The third batch was put in on Friday.
The man's doctor, vascular surgeon David Lewis, used maggots with huge success to treat wounds during his surgical training in the UK 10 years ago.
The treatment goes back to the Napoleonic wars in the early 1800s, when maggot-infested wounds were found to heal better than those without maggots. The same was found in World War I.
Lewis said suitable candidates were patients with poor circulation or wounds which were slow to heal.
"It's possibly going to lower the amputation rate and will allow patients a speedier recovery and limb function," he said.
"Rather than losing two toes, they might lose only one."
The Christchurch patient was diabetic and had his big right toe amputated in December. He was one day away from having his leg amputated when doctors decided to try other measures, including maggot therapy.
The maggots come from entomologist Dallas Bishop, who rears the European green blowfly maggots at the Wallaceville research centre in Upper Hutt.
Diabetes specialist podiatrist Angela Bayley plans to introduce maggot therapy at a new diabetes health service for Maori, starting in Auckland in April.
About 515 people a year lose a leg in New Zealand because of complications related to diabetes.
Sounds disgusting, but if it would save me from losing any limbs i'd sign up for this in a heartbeat. Would anyone else care to partake in some maggot cleansing?