Earlier this week we heard the story of Jackson Landers, an avid outdoorsman who spent his days photographing some of the world’s most dangerous animals. He’d tussled with bears and snakes, but his most recent near-death experience came from an animal smaller than a nickel. The culprit, a black widow spider, was hidden deep inside a pair shoes he had left out on the porch a night before.
Surrounded by Spiders
Black widows are more common than you might realize, as they can be found from Florida to New York, and as far west as Texas. Landers, who resides in Albemarle County, Virginia, noticed his first black widow web on the steps of his front porch. He took out the female spider with the help of some wasp spray, but her presence on his porch piqued his interest.
He set out on a quest to photograph and eliminate spiders near his home, as he wanted to help keep his children safe. Landers said he’d find and destroy dozens of black widows each day, and he even kept one in a Mason jar in his house for three months, feeding it a diet of moths and bugs all while observing the spider’s daily habits.
Like many nature enthusiasts before him, though, when you walk the line between safety and danger, you’re bound to cross it a time or two.
Surprisingly, Landers wasn’t bitten while out on a search for more black widows. On the same porch he had killed his first black widow, Landers stored some water shoes he used when he went fishing. On a warm spring afternoon, Landers decided he’d head down to the river and try his luck at catching some catfish. Moments after putting on the shoes, Landers felt a painful sting in one of his toes. After removing his shoes, Landers found the crushed remains of a black and red spider. He had been bitten by a black widow.
Dealing With the Bite
Since he had done some research on the spider when he first became interested in the specimen, Landers was more prepared than the average citizen to deal with the bite. He knew most healthy adults dealt with a lot of pain and some muscle spasms, but they often recovered on their own. Others, he knew, weren’t so lucky.
Hoping he had only received a small dose of venom, Landers decided to soak his foot in the river while he fished. As time passed, Landers noticed that his symptoms were intensifying. He decided to head to the University of Virginia hospital.
As Landers described it, he “was the hospital’s closest thing to a rock star.” Residents and medical students flocked to him, but he never received any drugs for the pain or spasms. Landers began to wonder if the doctors simply wanted him to ride out the pain when he was approached by Dr. Christopher Holstege, one of the hospital’s toxicologists.
Dr. Holstege explained that the hospital was one of several medical centers around the nation experimenting with a new type of antivenin derived from sheep. Antivenin is typically produced by injecting a horse with black widow venom in order to induce symptoms and isolate key substances. These substances are then extracted and processed in order to be used on humans. The problem with this type of antivenin is that many patients develop severe allegories to horse proteins, which can have deadly side effects of their own.
Dr. Holstege informed Landers that the antivenin produced by sheep had fewer impurities, so it should be safer for humans. The reason he hadn’t received any muscle relaxers or pain medications was because they would mask the effectiveness of the drug. The only problem was that the side effects had not been well documented, so Landers would more or less be a “guinea pig” for the hospital. Undeterred, Landers decided he wanted to have the injection, even though there was a 50 percent chance he might receive a placebo injection. Moments after receiving the mystery injection, Landers said, “This definitely wasn’t the placebo.”
Landers experienced positive results with the injection, and he was discharged from the hospital a few hours later. He believes although it will likely take years for more research to be conducted on the sheep antivenin, it could radically change the way hospitals treat black widow bites across the world.
Dr. Silverman comments
It’s always a good idea to check your shoes before putting them on. Odds are you won’t find a black widow spider like Jackson did, but you never know. Animals like to make their homes in dark, confined spaces. Also, if you have young kids in your house, odds are one of their toys or a handful of Cheerios has made its way into your shoe at one time or another. Take the extra second to check your shoes.
Related source: NY Times