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Jackhow123 t1_ivnxbre wrote

will this trigger an immune respond in the patient?

The antidote antibodies are not yours. Will your body attack the antidote?

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glacierre2 t1_ivo51lz wrote

If it is the first time, the body will take some time to make specific anti-antibodies, the antivenom has plenty of time to bind to the poison.

On a future second time (specially if the first was recent) you could get a race between the kinetics of your anti-antibodies binding the antivenom and the antibodies binding the poison. I would expect it would still work, but with decreased effect.

Finally, and this is the way that it always works, the poison + antibodies (yours or external) end up making a bigger clump that is consumed by cells of the immune system (macrophages), so ultimately you always get an immune response (but that does not necessarily mean an allergic reaction)

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ukezi t1_ivo5jl1 wrote

I would assume that on second exposure there would always be a significant amount of your own antibodies to fight the venom.

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Brandon432 t1_ivoqxqp wrote

Some patients develop a sensitivity to anti-venom. However, there is a common myth that you cannot have anti-venom more than once. It is totally false. If you do develop a sensitivity and have a reaction from a subsequent administration of anti-venom, that reaction is very easily managed in a hospital setting.

Addressing your comment below, anti-venom does not provide much if any lasting benefit. Snakebite vaccinations have not shown effective in humans or pets. First, the venom antibodies are relatively short-lived. Second, vaccinations work well when your immune system gets to have a fair foot race with an incubating infection. Snake bites don’t work that way. You can be delivered a lethal dose in half a second. No amount of vaccination can prep your body to catch up with a sudden envenomation.

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