Maggot therapy:

Few decades back when Sanjoy was working as a junior doctor in IGH, Rourkela he learnt a very interesting tip from an experienced dresser. A tribal woman was attacked by a bear while she was collecting mahula phula (photo) for making anarkali. This country liquor (anarkali) is made out of mahua flowers, very strong in flavor and in strength. Those who love alcohol can try it at least once. Bears also love to eat these flowers. Usually bear bites cases occur during summer months. The junior doctor had gone to the isolation ward on a morning round to see medical cases, when the dresser asked him if he was interested to see a badly mauled lady by a bear(surgical case), in the Jaraikala forest.

Sanjoy had never seen such cases in his life. The head and shoulder skin was out, the muscles and bones were visible and hundreds of maggots were crawling on the body of the unfortunate lady.

“Will she die?” asked the doctor.

“No, sir, she will survive because of these maggots” was the immediate reply from the dresser. He was a small man but dedicated worker, used to work from morning till evening. If anyone should have received Jahar award, (highest SAIL award some say Juhar award) it should have been that man.

There was no internet, no idea of maggot therapy. Hence Sanjoy smiled and left the ward. He learnt that actually the lady got a new lease of life due to the maggots. The dresser knew that if a wound has maggots then chances of septicemia is less as the maggots eat away the debris, bacteria and dead tissue. Now Maggot Doctors (MD) earn in millions through maggot therapy of diabetic wounds in USA. MD comes with a jar full of live Maggots (larvae of flies) leaves it on the infected wound and after few hours he collects them and goes back to his maggot laboratory.

In childhood Sanjoy was a naughty boy, used to create panic amongst his sisters by calling maggots as “mudhi with a tail”—see the photographs. Now Sanjoy knows how the Maggots work. 1. Debriment 2.Disinfection of the wound 3.Stimulation of healing 4.Biofilm inhibition and eradication

• In January 2004, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) granted permission to produce and market maggots for use in humans or animals as a prescription-only medical device for the following indications: "For deriding non-healing necrotic skin and soft tissue wounds, including pressure ulcers, venous stasis ulcers, neuropathic foot ulcers, and non-healing traumatic or post-surgical wounds."
• My  friends please bear with me for boring you with medical jargons, but isn’t it interesting? The summary of the story is we learn lessons every day even from juniors, an uneducated person and even from birds and animals.

Sanjoy Kumar Satpathy.