How cleaning hull=4 days in hospital

[yachtsmanbill]

My SCUBA instructor was extremely vocal about any cuts from coral/barnacles - saying that left untreated they will become infected. He made it sound extremely important to be cautious about this - he said to always wear a wet suit/gloves if doing any work or diving where you will come in contact with coral/barnacles. He also said treat immediately with peroxide. Further, he said that if you are in an area where they don't allow you to wear gloves - some marine nat parks (Czumel and Cayman, for example - don't touch anything!

Again - that was his advice/training. Personally I have no idea but he sure was adamant!

Hope you are all recovered.

Hey Mike,
I agree with leaving stuff alone, but when we dive Cozumel, I wear gloves. Our friends that have the dive business there frown on it, but I stick them in my wet suit and don them below. Fire coral is ruff stuff and then dont even think about stepping on an anemone. OUCH ! keep the ammonia handy too for the MOW's... I got a small scratch on my forearm that took over a month to heal. All that, and I cant stand diving in Lake Michigan. Too damn cold! Hmmm ws

[34Hatt]

Wow Charlie that could have been real bad Infection with a new valve!!!
Glad your doing better..

[(Nobody You Know)]

Charlie,

You rare truly blessee to have a very talanted daughter!

You also gotta break the “hospital” habit. Twice in one year is enough for anyone! And you proved that the lack of bathing can expedite nurse care and hence, early recovery! LOL.

This thread and it’s responses have helped to make us aware of the possibility of new water born infections and what should be doen in the way of immediate treatment.

I hope you will not let this experience stop you from going under in the future; protective gloves, etc., withstanding.

Glad you have recovered - again!

[Jaxfishgyd]

I had been out of work due to the heart valve for 134 days and had only been back to work 4 days before this latest "incident". Know management is talking about it, but it's one of the few good things of being union- I got full pay the entire time for both......

I DID get a daily "sponge bath" in the hospital !

[Rickysa]

Charlie,
Glad to hear all is well...did they have an idea of the ID of the bacteria? I thought I posted here about an incident my Dad had last July but a search didn't pull it up...

We were fishing just of the beach for Spainish Mackeral, and he got nicked by one when removing the hook (really small on his thumb)...few days later his wrist was sore...then he noticed swelling/red lines from the nicked area...this led to surgery and a week in the hospital.

"Fish Handler's disease"...Mycobacterium marinum...now we keep a bucket of bleach water on the boat at all times when fishing to wash hands when handling fish.

Rick

[Paul45c]

Mike, I think I can back up what your scuba instructor told you about coral & barnacles. A friend that helps me with some boat maintenance showed up at the boat with a REALLY swollen thumb -- I mean, I'm talking about a Fred Flintstone thumb right after he whacks it with the hammer. Of course I told him to go to the doctor. He told me he did, and they gave him some antibiotics. Thumb was still really swollen, and now getting very dark red/purplish around his nail area, so he went back to the doctor after about 4 more days. There wasn't fluid to drain or a cyst to excise, so they sent him home with much stronger antibiotics.

Five days later, it's as big and sore as ever, so the doctor now has him meet at the hospital for an outpatient little exploratory work. They cut into it, scraped around some, couldn't find any foreign matter or anything to blame it all on, and in the end kept him on the antibiotics. It took about 6 or 7 weeks for his thumb to get back to looking normal. The docs suspect a very small piece of a barnacle. They said that marine organisms of almost all kinds, but especially crustaceans, are almost immune to standard antibiotics and always take a long time to deal with.

He wasn't diving my boat, but he might have scraped a piling or something. Ever since, I've been super careful, because I DO dive my boat fairly regularly.

[Angela]

Charlie,

Glad to hear you're recovering from the ordeal.

I've learned a couple of things from this thread: (1) Keep the diver who scrubs the bottom once a month; (2) Stop working in the engine rooms and bilges in a bikini (but, it's so hot in there.....!). LOL

[Boatsb]

Angela the bikini is just not for the engine room. Not enough material to wipe the hands on. Old T shirts are the best . They are absorbent and "disposable" so there is no need to wash them afterwards.

[CHECK 6]

Glad to here you are doing better I once had a cloged holding tank vent the copper screen turned green and pluged up and when i stuck my head in engine room got a good amount of methane gas, spliting headace . nausa and ended up in hosipital for 6 hrs till i felt better ...Cory

[spartonboat1]

Very timely post. I just returned from lengthy time at boat, during which was on hands and knees around the heads and in engine room, including good scrapes (broken skin) on shins and knees. Got back home with major intestinal issues that have been several weeks in calming down. Sorry for gory detail, but was like a major intestinal blockage had occurred...very concerning. Finally resettled back to "normal", but I will be more mindful of cleaning wounds and bandaging. He-man approach not so good.

I damn near died from a major reaction to volative chemicals in paints that was migrating into my skin, when I worked at the Ford Wixom plant in Wixom, MI (loooong time ago, when it had 13,000 hourly working 7 days a week and was the most profitable plant under one roof in the world. Now its fully closed I think, at least was down to 1,300 emps in 06, but I digress). At any rate I blew up like a balloon with blisters "all over"...was later fingerprinted by USCG for job sailing on commercial vessels on Great Lakes and had no fingerprints- only spiderwebs. Ford took a look and sez, oh, Poison Ivy...here's some Calomine lotion...wunnerful guys.

At any rate, excellent post/thread...