He thought it was a bruise: musician almost loses leg after spider bite

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The leg of singer-songwriter Gabe Lustman from Atlanta (USA) suddenly starts to itch. At first he thought he had bumped into something. “It looked like a target, like a bruise.”

“I started scratching and scratching myself, and then it started changing color,” the 30-year-old told the NY Post. He first noticed the bite on August 18, after which he started feeling worse.

“I couldn’t put any pressure on my leg”

After a performance he feels so bad that he goes to the hospital. The staff there soon discovered that his leg was infected. The clear diagnosis was not made until a day later, when an infectious disease specialist examined him.

Lustman reacted almost too late. According to the doctors, if he had waited any longer, he would have had to amputate his leg, otherwise he could have died. «I waited until I could no longer walk, I was limping. I couldn’t put any pressure on my leg.”

He still cannot put weight on his leg

Eventually his condition improves. Lustman can leave the hospital, but he is not yet healthy: he cannot yet fully bear weight on his leg and still has dry, dead skin around his leg and a scar from the bite site.

The brown recluse spider is mainly found in the Midwest and southern United States. Lustman is happy that the bite went smoothly. “I was very scared. But now I am very grateful that I can keep my leg.”

Source: Blick