The 47-year-old patient was on vacation in South Africa at a wildlife reserve when the cobra surprised him from below. He waited three hours for a helicopter to fly him to the nearest trauma center, according to the report, during which he felt a burning pain spread from his genitals up into his abdomen and chest.
When he arrived at the hospital, he had "swollen genitals with a deep purple discoloration, indicating scrotal necrosis," the researchers wrote; doctors administered eight doses of snake venom antiserum, as well as medications to control his fever, dialysis for injury to his kidneys, and debridement of his sack and shaft that involved excising a lot of his genital tissue.
According to the original paper in which this prodigious moment of medical history was recorded, the man was fortunate that the snake venom never affected his brain, although he did have to get a hemodialysis to treat an acute kidney injury. He also had to receive a skin graft on his penis. One year later, the man has made a full physical recovery, though I suspect the trauma of snake-bitten balls may haunt him for a while.
The paper also has some photographs of the injury, which I think Vice describes perfectly as "a badly-sewn Tim Burton puppet, with a long, thick stitch running straight up the middle." Naturally, I couldn't resist my morbid curiosity at such a description; your personal mileage for gruesome penile injuries may vary.
Man Experiences 'Scrotal Necrosis' After Cobra Bites His Balls [Samantha Cole / Vice]
Scrotal necrosis after cobra (Naja annulifera) envenomation [G.H.Dijkemaa, J.J.Pat, and M.G.Steffens / Urology Case Reports]
Source: Boing Boing
