For Your Information
The post-exposure rabies vaccine hurts. Big time. No kids, turns out they weren’t lying to get you to stay away from stray animals. Let me break it down for you:
The first round of shots post-exposure (I’m not talking about your regular preventative rabies vaccine, these are the shots you get AFTER you have been bitten by or had other physical contact with a rabid animal)… anyway, the first round of shots are actually something called rabies immunoglobulin. The amount you are given is dependent on your weight and for me at roughly 113 it was appx. two and a half GIANT syringes. Okay, I admit I say appx. because when I saw the size of the syringes I tried not to look at them again so I have no clue how much was in the third.
The good news: post-exposure rabies shots are no longer a series of eight shots given in the stomach! Hooray!
The bad news: the series is just as long and they still hurt a whole heck of a lot.
Keep in mind now that if you are scared of needles, you should know you have no reason to be afraid of getting these shots! That’s right! All you aichmophobes and belonephobes should seriously consider changing your titles to “trypanophobe.” Unless of course sewing makes you anxious or when the nurse enters the room with a syringe you legitimately believe the needle is going to jump off the tray and attack you. In those cases you could rightly call yourself aichmophobic or belonephobic. However, if you are like most, then you fear the actual injection, making you trypanophobic. In this case, aichmophobes and belonephobes can rest easy. But trypanophobes beware! The reason being of course that the needle itself is not the cause of the pain, rather the actual injection is what makes your eyes well up like an eight–year–old girl. With the rabies immunoglobulin, that is a lot of liquid being injected into your body and trust me, you can feel every bit of it going in. In my case, like I said before, I had three shots of the immunoglobulin: one in each thigh and one in my left arm. The two completely full syringes went into my thighs and luckily there were two nurses who did those shots simultaneously.
OuCh! oUCh! OucH!
Now usually, rabies immunoglobulin is given at the site of exposure (usually in the form of a bite or a scratch). Since my exposure was “non-bite” they were able to spread the shots out, which is great because instead of having one really, really sore arm I have four fairly sore limbs. Four? But I only received three immunoglobulin shots, right? Right. Now let’s talk about the vaccine.
After you are given the rabies immunoglobulin, you receive your FIRST injection of the rabies vaccine. Yay! Four shots in one day! All four limbs! And the best part is… for me, at least, the rabies vaccine injection was the one that hurt the most. It could have been the injection site, or various other factors I suppose, but this shot stung, burned, then tingled. Once the tingling wore off, my whole right arm became very sore. So sore in fact that I grimace while changing out of a t–shirt. Even writing with a pencil or pen hurts. But oh, it gets better: I get four more of the rabies vaccine over the next month!
Here is how the whole process works starting from Day 0 (as soon as possible after exposure). Please keep in mind that I didn’t include the amount of time you spend in the emergency room waiting to get each shot, nor did I include Day -1, the day where you spend an hour in the waiting room and over an hour in the exam room only to be told that the oh–so–important rabies immunoglobulin is nowhere to be found in your entire city and it had to be special ordered and shipped and would you please come back tomorrow? And by the way, you really should have expected this. After all, this is Day -1, not Day 0…sheash, pay attention! Anyway how the series is laid out:
Day 0: Rabies immunoglobulin and series one of the rabies vaccine
Day 3: Rabies vaccine
Day 7: Rabies vaccine
Day 14: Rabies vaccine
Day 28: Rabies vaccine
Again, keep in mind that wait times will vary depending on the intelligence of fellow accident–prone inhabitants of your city as well as the ability of the ER staff to not “misplace” a $2000 vaccine, or get you confused with someone else.
So in short: the shots hurt like hell yesterday and I have to go back four more times before I’m done with this. Also, please realize that this was in no way intended to scare you away from getting the vaccine if you need it. If you have been exposed to rabies or think you might have been, please contact your health department and get it taken care of as soon as possible. Also, if you have had a pre-exposure rabies vaccine you will still need to have post-exposure injections, a series consisting of two rabies vaccine injections but no immunoglobulin. Make sure you tell your doctor if you have had a pre-exposure vaccine.
Rabies is nothing to mess around with and after you start showing symptoms, there is no cure. Rabies is almost always fatal once symptoms begin which can be anywhere from a few days after exposure or even a year. So don’t wait! Better safe than sorry, right?
And on that note…. have a wonderful evening and if you were planning on snuggling with a rabid animal, I would consider canceling!
Learn to Be Still 