White Julian, Weinstein Scott A
Toxinology Department, Women's & Children's Hospital, North Adelaide 5006, Australia.
Toxinology Department, Women's & Children's Hospital, North Adelaide 5006, Australia.
Toxicon. 2014 Sep;87:76-80. doi: 10.1016/j.toxicon.2014.05.021. Epub 2014 Jun 9.
The Australian white-tailed spiders ("WTS"; Lamponidae: notably Lampona cylindrata &Lampona murina) have a continuing reputation on Internet sites as a cause of skin ulceration, labelled "necrotic arachnidism", despite an increasing number of peer-reviewed publications debunking this reputation, with >135 confirmed cases now reported without any evidence of necrosis. We present here a case of confirmed WTS bite in a 42-year old male, followed for over a month, with photos of bite site signs and no development of skin ulceration/necrosis. The patient was initially alarmed by information on the Internet suggesting local necrosis would result from the bite. We discuss the evolution of knowledge about bites by the WTS, and the persistence of misconceptions about their factually mild medical significance.
澳大利亚白尾蜘蛛（“WTS”；灯蛛科：尤其是柱形灯蛛和穆氏灯蛛）在互联网上一直背负着导致皮肤溃疡的恶名，被称为“坏死性蛛毒中毒”，尽管越来越多的同行评审出版物驳斥了这一恶名，目前已有超过135例确诊病例报告，且没有任何坏死迹象。我们在此呈现一例42岁男性确诊被WTS咬伤的病例，对其随访了一个多月，提供了咬伤部位体征的照片，且未出现皮肤溃疡/坏死情况。患者最初因互联网上暗示咬伤会导致局部坏死的信息而感到恐慌。我们讨论了关于WTS咬伤的知识演变，以及对其实际轻微医学意义的误解为何持续存在。
