In May of 1990...my hospital roommate during a 3 week stay after almost being took out by my gallbladder was a HVAC man bitten on the back of his elbow by a brown recluse. While no one saw the spider..it was not collected and sent to a professional for ID...However:
1. It happened in NW GA...well within the range of the fiddleback...or brown recluse.
2. He had been working in the attic of an old house the day before being admitted...a place anyone from around here that spends time in attics or crawlspaces knows is prime habitat for the brown recluse....It is a reclusive creature.
3. The bite was identified by two experts in brown recluse bites...The owner of the HVAC company who sent his employee to the emergency room when said employee showed up for work with a small hole in his elbow the size of an eraser...which have started as a small pimple the day before..because the HVAC company owner lost a good man to disability 15 years previous after the man lost his arm below the elbow after showing up to work with the same hole in his elbow. HVAC men around here know the brown recluse well.
The second expert to ID the bite was Orthapedic Surgeon Dr. Michael Slutsky..who had skillfully saved the limbs of many brown recluse bite victims in this area for years. I heard him tell HVAC man just how close he came to losing his arm below the elbow...another 12 hours in delay and it was a goner.IV antibiotics that cost 1,00 bucks a bag and several hours surgery scraping bone free of dead tissue saved the HVAC man’s arm.
The man was admitted on the Friday I was with a eraser sized hole...we both headed to the Er at the same time the next morning...the hole was the size of a half dollar...and I could see his elbow joint.
Now...You can believe About.com guide Debbie Hadley if you want...but I’m gonna go with those with skin in the game. Miss Hadley is free to come to fiddleback country and let herself get bit to show us just how harmless the fiddleback is.
I don't believe she said that no one ever gets a serious injury from a Brown Recluse. I know that they do so it doesn't matter. I do know one thing for certain though. A Recluse bite can be entirely cured with an herbal poultice leaving no scar and alleviating almost all of the pain while it's working. I am the son of a physician and I would never go to a physician for a Brown Recluse bite.