She endured three surgeries to remove the contaminated tissue and muscle.
A 59-year-old woman from Scotland was diagnosed with a rare flesh-eating disease that left her butt with a 20 centimetres deep wound. Jongh Eglin, who now lives in the Netherlands, stated that she started displaying flu-like symptoms on January 20. She was rushed to a hospital after going into septic shock and collapsing, as per a report in the New York Post.
When medical professionals discovered a sizable black lump on Ms Eglin’s left buttock, they determined that she had necrotizing fasciitis, a potentially fatal bacterial infection. Her family was informed that she only had a 10 per cent chance of survival after she endured three surgeries to remove the contaminated tissue and muscle. She also spent nine days in a coma. “It’s been so traumatic and changed my life forever. I’ve lost (70 pounds) and had to learn to walk again. Even now, I still can’t sit down and have to take a special pillow out with me wherever I go,” she said.
Aldrik, Eglin’s 65-year-old husband, became worried in January when his wife began sweating a lot and had trouble walking. Her condition was identified as necrotizing fasciitis upon arrival at Gelderland Valley Hospital in the Netherlands. The fast-spreading illness destroys the soft tissue of the body. The woman added, “My husband had to drive behind the ambulance, not knowing whether I’d come out of it alive.”
Although the cause of the disease is still unknown, Ms Eglin was told by doctors that the cause might have been something as simple as an ingrown hair or a spot. “My family were told to prepare for the worst – they didn’t think I’d make it. I spent nine days in a coma, and when I finally came to, I was incredibly disorientated and kept hallucinating. I woke up to a catheter, a stoma, and a 20-centimetre-deep wound – it took two hours every day for the nurses to change my bandages and clean my wounds,” she added. The woman will now require a colostomy bag for the rest of her life.
After spending six weeks in the hospital, she was transferred to a rehabilitation facility, where she received occupational therapy, speech therapy, physiotherapy, and psychotherapy for many weeks. “I was left completely broken and had to rebuild my life. I was so weak, my voice changed, and I had to learn how to walk again. The physical recovery has been incredibly painful, but mentally I’ve struggled the most,” Ms Eglin continued.
“Without the quick thinking of my husband and the speed of the doctors and ambulance service, I would not be here,” she said, adding that people should seek medical attention in case a flu episode seems to develop into something more.