As a stricken Georgia college student struggles to recover after being infected with flesh-eating bacteria last week, a second case has been reported in Greenville, South Carolina, where a new mother who recently delivered twins is in critical condition.
(MORE: Necrotizing Fasciitis: The Flesh-Eating Disease One Georgia Grad Student Is Fighting)
Lana Kuykendall, 36, delivered a pair of healthy twins, Abigail and Ian, last week at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. But she had only been home from the maternity ward for a few hours when she noticed a small red and black bruise on her leg, roughly the size of her palm. The bruise — now identified as necrotizing fasciitis or flesh-eating bacteria — began to grow about one quarter of an inch an hour. By the time she checked back into the hospital, it was the size of a sheet of paper.
By that point, the high-risk OB physician “had a suspicion of what it was,” husband Darren Kuykendall, 42, told the Greenville News, and hustled her into an operating room. He also said doctors removed dead skin and tissue in the first surgery, a little more tissue during a second and third surgery, but nothing else was found in the last surgery on Monday.
(MORE: College Student Battles Flesh-Eating Bacteria After Zip Line Accident)
This comes roughly a week after another recent case of flesh-eating bacteria in the south involving 24-year-old Georgia graduate student, Aimee Copeland, who contracted the infection after suffering a severe gash in her leg in a zip line accident. Her left leg was eventually amputated.
As of now, Lana Kuykendall is stable, but doctors and her husband remain cautious.
“They are saying things are leaning her way. Her vitals are good and lab results are looking good,” he said. “But this could go either way at any given time.”
As a stricken Georgia college student struggles to recover after being infected with flesh-eating bacteria last week, a second case has been reported in Greenville, South Carolina, where a new mother who recently delivered twins is in critical condition.
(MORE: Necrotizing Fasciitis: The Flesh-Eating Disease One Georgia Grad Student Is Fighting)
Lana Kuykendall, 36, delivered a pair of healthy twins, Abigail and Ian, last week at Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. But she had only been home from the maternity ward for a few hours when she noticed a small red and black bruise on her leg, roughly the size of her palm. The bruise — now identified as necrotizing fasciitis or flesh-eating bacteria — began to grow about one quarter of an inch an hour. By the time she checked back into the hospital, it was the size of a sheet of paper.
By that point, the high-risk OB physician “had a suspicion of what it was,” husband Darren Kuykendall, 42, told the Greenville News, and hustled her into an operating room. He also said doctors removed dead skin and tissue in the first surgery, a little more tissue during a second and third surgery, but nothing else was found in the last surgery on Monday.
(MORE: College Student Battles Flesh-Eating Bacteria After Zip Line Accident)
This comes roughly a week after another recent case of flesh-eating bacteria in the south involving 24-year-old Georgia graduate student, Aimee Copeland, who contracted the infection after suffering a severe gash in her leg in a zip line accident. Her left leg was eventually amputated.
As of now, Lana Kuykendall is stable, but doctors and her husband remain cautious.
“They are saying things are leaning her way. Her vitals are good and lab results are looking good,” he said. “But this could go either way at any given time.”