Saludos.
Me he tardado un poco en responder pues no recordaba en donde estaba la información. Está algo atrasada (1982), pero me parece muy interesante. A ver qué opinan.
Suerte.
PD. Lo malo es que está en inglés, y no tuve tiempo de traducirlo. También se perdió algo de información al final, en cuanto pueda les mando el resto. Perdón.
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UNITED STATES ARMY
INSTITUTE FOR MILITARY ASSISTANCE
ST31-91B
US ARMY SPECIAL FORCES MEDICAL HANDBOOK
(1 MARCH 1982)
CHAPTER 22
PRIMITIVE MEDICINE
22-3. MAGGOT THERAPY FOR DEBRIDEMENT
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a. Introducing maggots into a wound can be hazardous because the wound must be exposed to flies. Flies, because of their filthy habits, are likely to introduce bacteria into the wound, causing additional complications. Maggots will also invade live, healthy tissue when the dead tissue is gone or not readily available. Maggot invasion of healthy tissue causes extreme pain and hemorrhage, possibly severe enough to be fatal.
b. Despite the hazards involved, maggot therapy should be considered a viable alternative when, in the absence of antibiotics, a wound becomes severely infected, does not heal, and ordinary debridement is impossible.
(1) All bandages should be removed so that the wound is exposed to circulating flies. Flies are attracted to foul or fetid odors caning from the infected wound; they will not deposit eggs on fresh, clean wounds.
(2) In order to limit further contamination of the wound by disease organisms carried by the flies, those flies attracted to the wound should not be permitted to light directly on the wound surface. Instead, their activity should be restricted to the intact skin surface along the edge of the wound. Live maggots deposited here and/or maggots hatching from eggs deposited here will. find their way into the wound with less additional contanination than if the flies were allowed free access to the wound.
(3) One exposure to the flies is usually all that is necessary to insure more than enough maggots for thorough debridement of a wound. Therefore, after the flies have deposited eggs, the wound should be covered with a bandage.
(4) The bandage should be removed daily to check for maggots. If no maggots are observed in the wound within 2 days after exposure to the flies, the bandage should be removed and the wound should be re-exposed. If the wound is found to be teeming with maggots when the bandage is removed, as many as possible should be removed using forceps or some other sterilized instrument or by flushing with sterile water. only 50-100 maggots should be allowed to remain in the wound.
(5) Once the maggots have become established in the wound, it should be covered with a bandage again, but the maggot activity should be monitored closely each day. A frothy fluid produced by the maggots will make it difficult to see them. This fluid should be “sponged out” of the wuond with an absorbent cloth so that all of the maggots in the wound can be seen. Care should be taken not to remove the maggots with the fluid.
(6) The period of time necessary for maggot debridement of a wound depends on a number of factors, including the depth and extent of the wound, the part of the body affected, the number of maggots present in the wound, and the fly species involved. In a survival situation, an individual will be able to control only one of these factors-the number, and sometimes not even that; therefore, the exact time to remove the maggots cannot be given in specific numbers of hours or days. However, it can be said with certainty that the maggots should be removed immediately once they have removed all the dead tissue and before they have become established in healthy tissue. When the maggots begin feeding on normal, healthy tissue, the individual will experience an increased level of pain at the site of the wound as the maggots cane into. contact with “live” nerves. ......................
It should heal normally provided there are no further complications.