Ick. Ick. Ick.

I was watching The War on DVR with The Man and one of the soldiers was interviewing about how he got hit in the arm while riding in the Ball Turret (I think) during a bombing raid and was going to get his arm amputated because he had osteomyelitis, which is probably not spelled right, and which is probably a bone infection of some sort. But then the chief of surgery at the army hospital decided to save his arm. Which is good.



So the surgeon puts the arm in a cast. Then he drills a hole in the cast and fills the hole with maggots and covers the hole with a wire mesh cage of some sort. And the maggots eat the infected tissue and the bone heals and the arm is saved. Which is great.


I am an educated person and I watch a lot of TV. I have heard of the maggot cure before. I have seen it dramatized (e.g., one the Sharpe's episodes) in fiction, but it is always done on an unconscious patient. Now I get to visualize maggots eating the flesh of someone who is both conscious and alive.



Yuck yuck and double yuck. I am very happy for the soldier whose arm was saved. Truly I am. But man oh man I did not need that mental picture. Ewwww.