Seaside teacher sucks venom from snake bite, helps save a life

SANTA ROSA BEACH - Rick Sprouse of Santa Rosa Beach almost lost his arm — and his life — after being bit by a water moccasin recently.

But thanks to his quick-thinking roommate, Sprouse is alive to tell the tale.

Sprouse, along with Seaside teacher Charlotte Sause, came across two water moccasins while he was helping her clean out the barn on her 5.6-acre farm in late October.

“Charlotte was out in the barn feeding the horses,” Rick said. “She came and got me because the snakes didn’t look like water moccasins and she wasn’t sure if they were poisonous.”

Normally Rick would just grab his shotgun and take care of business, but he was out of shells, so he had to resort to using his .22.

“That is all I had,” Rick said. “I shot each of them twice.”

The snakes were still squirming, so Rick just pinned the first snake’s head down and picked it up in his right hand while bending down to pick up the second snake.

As soon as he turned to walk out of the barn he was in trouble.

“The one in my left hand sunk its teeth in and bit all the way through my thumb,” Rick said.

The snake wouldn’t let go. Rick said that he was literally shaking his arm “back and forth trying to get the snake to let go.”

“While most snakes will not give you all of their venom,” Rick said. “I think since this one was dying, he gave me all of it.”

He said the pain came within minutes of being bitten.

“The pain in my hand was like fire,” he said. “By the time we got to the house, the pain was up to my shoulder and my whole arm began to swell up.”

Rick said he normally has a snake bite kit handy, but they didn’t have it with them this time.

Immediately after he was bitten, he knew it was serious.

“It was the worst pain that I have ever felt,” he said. “I was throwing up all the way back to the house.”

This is when Charlotte took over and calmly walked Rick into the house and began to rinse the wound with hydrogen peroxide.

“I don’t know what I was thinking,” Charlotte said. “I just stuck his thumb in my mouth and started to suck the venom out.”

She said that she had never done something like this before and that it happened so fast she didn’t really think about what she was doing.

“I saw how much pain he was in so I knew it was bad,” Charlotte said. “I have seen those little snake bite kits and there is no way it would have worked.”

Charlotte just sat there sucking the venom out and spitting it into the sink.

“The taste was horrible and I couldn’t feel my tongue,” she said. “But I kept going.”

Charlotte described the taste as if you had drunk orange juice just after brushing your teeth.

Typically with a snake bite kit, you have a string that can be used to tie off the area, then you cut into the wound with the provided razor and use the suction mechanism to draw the venom out.

Charlotte applied a tourniquet to Rick’s lower arm and then another near his shoulder while a friend called the hospital in advance and alerted them to the situation.

“They were waiting for us,” Rick said. “They wanted to immediately get me to Pensacola.”

Once Rick was in Pensacola, he received 12 bags of anti-venom, in addition to the doses of morphine and dilaudid he was already given in the ambulance.

Rick was in the intensive care unit for three days and his arm swelled to almost 24 inches around.

“They wanted to amputate my arm,” Rick said. “The doctors told me if it hadn’t been for the tourniquets and Charlotte sucking the venom out, it would have been life threatening.”

Now that Rick is home and feeling better, the two can sit back and re-think what happened and learn from it.

“No matter what,” Charlotte said. “If you are not sure of the snake, you shouldn’t handle it.”

She said that water moccasins are terribly aggressive and that she has seen them go after her horses in the barn.

Charlotte said that if she had to do it all over again she would not hesitate.

“I would do the exact same thing,” she said. “I’m not suggesting people suck venom out of people, because it could hurt them too.”

Kim Gordon, who teaches at Seaside Elementary School with Charlotte, was amazed by the quick thinking of her friend and colleague.

“How many people can say they helped save a life?” Gordon said. “This is a story of calmness, and a willingness to do what it takes in the face of an emergency.”