Without a nose, without arms, without legs… a woman who lost all her limbs due to a bacteria transmitted by dogs

Last April, a 64-year-old French woman living in Italy had to have her nose and all her limbs amputated. The cause was a potentially deadly bacterium: Capnocytophaga canimorsus.

“I'm dying”, the sixty-year-old repeated to herself in her hospital bed last April. In the Point, she recounts the terrible weeks that followed her infection with a deadly bacteria. In the end, she escaped the worst, at the cost of her four limbs and her nose.

Alarming symptoms

When she was overcome by violent headaches and vomiting, this woman from Boulogne-sur-Mer did not worry right away. But her symptoms worsened and she was finally taken to hospital a few days later.

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She was placed in intensive care and then put into a coma before two weeks later, doctors identified the origin of her illness: Capnocytophaga canimorsus. necrosis began to appear on the sexagenarian's limbs, as well as on her nose. She is transferred to France to be amputated.

Finally, after months of rehabilitation, she tells our colleagues that she has “still desire to live and laugh”.

Capnocytophaga canimorsus

Capnocytophaga canimorsus is a bacterium found in the saliva of cats and dogs, notes Vidal. Since 1976, approximately 200 cases have been reported worldwide world. While the disease is less virulent in healthy people, it can be fatal in fragile people with a weakened immune system.

In case of symptoms of infection After a dog bite, it is recommended to consult a doctor. The disease is treated with antibiotics.