Rabies Treatment
Guidelines For Rabies Treatment
There is no rabies treatment that will cure the disease once you are symptomatic. Any treatment administered after the signs and symptoms start is largely done just to make you comfortable. Death is almost certain once you begin showing the clinical signs of rabies.
If you are bitten by an animal you suspect may be rabid, try to have someone contain the animal, while you thoroughly wash the wound with soap and water. If the animal tests positive for rabies, or if you are unable to isolate the animal for testing, then post-exposure rabies treatment should begin immediately. If you catch and test the animal and it does not have rabies, you will not be required to go through the treatments.
Post-exposure rabies treatment involves one dose of rabies immune globulin, administered as soon as possible after the bite or attack. Immune globulins are proteins that fight disease and provide you with temporary antibodies. Rabies immune globulins are developed from antibodies of donors of blood who were given the rabies vaccine. The antibodies will help to give you temporary protection until your body can produce its own.
This is followed by a regimen of five vaccine doses over the next twenty-eight days. The older vaccines required painful injections, usually in the stomach, and you could experience numerous side-effects. The current vaccines are relatively painless and can be given in the arm, rather than the more tender stomach. The vaccine works by stimulating your immune system to produce antibodies that will neutralize the rabies virus. Your body will develop a protective immune response, before the virus reaches your brain.
Although the vaccines are now relatively painless, you may experience mild side-effects. These include swelling or redness at the injection site, headache, fever, nausea, muscle aches or dizziness. You should contact your doctor if any of the side-effects cause you more than a little discomfort.
Doctors often recommend a series of pre-exposure vaccinations, to keep a person who may later be exposed to rabies from developing the disease. This pre-exposure treatment consists of three vaccinations over a 21 or 28 day period. Classes of people who are at risk for exposure to rabies include veterinarians and animal handlers, laboratory workers, and others who come into contact often with animals who may be infected, or with serums which may carry the virus.
No human in the United States has developed rabies after exposure to the virus, if the post-exposure rabies treatment regimen is followed. The sooner it can be started, the better.
The most effective way of dealing with rabies is still prevention. Know what the risks are, vaccinate your pets, and keep them and your family away from wild or stray animals.