Flesh-eating germ kills woman in three days

[alicia-w]

North Carolina nursing assistant cut her finger on a wheelchair

The Associated Press
Updated: 9:09 p.m. ET March 9, 2006


DUNN, N.C. - North Carolina health officials are investigating the death of a woman who died last week of a flesh-eating bacteria three days after accidentally jamming her hand in a wheelchair while working at a nursing home.

Nursing assistant Sharron Bishop, 44, died Feb. 27. A doctor said a rare flesh-eating bacteria may have entered her body through a thumb injury and she turned from healthy to fatally ill.

The culprit was a rare invasive form of group A streptococcal bacteria, said Debbie Crane, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Health and Human Services. The noninvasive form is widespread and is commonly known for causing strep throat, she said.

"It's kind of like getting bitten by a shark or struck by lightning," she said. "It's not something that spreads to the community."

North Carolina gets about 125 reports of the invasive form of strep annually, and about 10 percent are fatal, she said.

David Bishop said doctors at UNC Hospitals, where Sharron Bishop died, have told him it's impossible to know how his wife contracted the rare infection.

"The UNC doctors said she could have picked it up at the gas station, at the grocery store, anywhere," he said. "We will never know."

Sharon Bishop complained on Feb. 24 about a swollen thumb. She had jammed it at work and worried that she had dislocated it. David Bishop took her to Betsy Johnson Regional Hospital, where doctors gave her pain medication and sent her home.

The swelling got worse. By the morning of Feb. 27, her arm was twice as large as normal and looked like it would burst, David Bishop said. Fluid leaked from her elbow and wrist. She complained of terrific pain.

Dunn physician Abraham Oudeh diagnosed necrotizing fasciitis, an infection that destroys tissue.

Doctors at UNC Hospitals that evening tried to stop the spreading infection by amputating her arm at the clavicle and removing all the muscle and tissue around her left breast, torso and thigh in a futile effort to save her life.

Harnett County Health Director John Rouse Jr. said Bishop's was one of two confirmed cases of the bacteria that his office investigated in recent days after being notified by state health authorities. He said he believed the other woman, whom he also did not identify, knew Bishop.

Rouse said it would be impossible to determine whether they passed the bacteria to each other. Rouse said the other woman is recovering.

[TexasStooge]

[SouthFloridawx]

that is sad...

[brunota2003]

wow...uh...that is a little close...in the same state...

[azsnowman]

I know this bacteria has been around for YEARS, if not EONS seems like it surfaces once in a great while.......but that goes to show ya, I will NEVER, EVER be put in a old folks home, there's just TOOOOOOOOOOO many weird diseases in those places due to unsanitary conditions. I've been 3 nursing homes over the past 40 years and I don't care HOW clean it looks on the outside, there's them thar little boogers creepin' around in the cracks and crevices.

Dennis

[beachbum_al]

This is really scary. My four year was diagnosed with staph infection caused by an ant bite that got infected. The staph spread through out her body so quick that we didn't even know what was going on. She is okay now but hearing stories like this just makes me want to go put all three of my girls in plastic bubbles in protect them.

[Yankeegirl]

My daughter has also had issues with staph and bug bites, scratches, etc. She seems to get a lot of boils in her diaper area, the doc said its staph... I just got out of the hospital last week for a staph infection... I had a really sore upper right arm, and I went to the Er for the pain, they said it was tendonitis and bursitis, they sent me home with some Vicodin and anti inflamitories... Two days later my arm started swelling from the shoulder to below the elbow very quickly (within a matter of hrs there was a noticable difference).. So I went back to the ER, this time is was cellutits, and got admitted... They had to do an ultrasounded needle in there (about one and a half inches into my arm, below the muscle) and drain some 12cc. of puss... I know, its gross!! But after they did that, it was like night and day!! The pressure was gone and I could move better... I was sent home with some strong antibiotics for 2 weeks, and not allowed to go to work for 2 weeks... still might be catchy... Its amazing, I have never had such pain!