DIYS Cure for Sea urchin punctures

    As some of you may recall, I was severely wounded by a Sea urchin while snorkeling with my kids two weeks ago. I was in 2 feet of water not wearing any fins and while moving my arms to swim like breast stroke, a "Diadema antillana" urchin was touched by my left hand letting 42 spines into it. Some of them just passed through my hand one side to the other and the pain was really bad.


    Here is wat I did and had worked well so far:


    1. Remove inmediately and very carefully every spine you can being very carefull not to break them while pulling out. You can use your fingers or some pliers. This has to be done as fast as you can, since the skin hardens once dried.


    2. Submerge the affected area with the hottest water you can withstand for 10 or more minutes. Most marine venoms are temperature sensitive. This works also with jellyfish and other marine creatures venoms.


    3. With a hypodermic needdle (the ones used for injections), carefully try to remove any spine that is located under your skin. Other kind of needdle don't work as well because they don't have cutting edges like hypodermic. This procedue will be bloody, so if you are easily impressed, ask someone else to do it for you.


    Doing this, I could manage to take out most of the spines. Just 6 of them were still into my hand, so I started asking for "Grandma's remedies". Someone came out with placing a piece of aspirine over the affected area and cover it with some adhesive tape. The theory is that the acid wil disolve the skin around the spine allowing me to reach it later on. It didn't work as well as I wanted to, so using the same theory, I went to Walgreens and bought DuoFilm® Salicylic Acid wart remover. It comes with "cover-up" dics to cever the affected area.


    After 4 applications (one week) 4 of the spines just went out. They are not there any more! I still have 2 of them, one should be touching a nerve, since I feel like electricity in one finger, but the pain is way less.


    I will keep my "treatment" for one more week. If the "electricity" persist, I will see a doctor.


    Just wanted to share my experience with you guys, in case same thing happens to you (hopefully not...) :rolleyes1:

    Thank you very much for sharing this. I didn't know some spines went right through your hand. The spines must be very stiff and your stroke was strong when you hit the sea urchin. Heal fast and please let us know the next step in the ordeal. Fortunate that it didn't happen to one of the children.


    Personally I never had a deep puncture from one of these guys. However one of my friends, in the course of climbing out of the sea on the steep Cuban shoreline, stuck his toes in a crevice in the rocks and into a sea urchin. At home I helped him get a couple of spines out of his big toe. I used a razor to cut open the skin deep enough to expose and grab with tweezers the tip of the spine and pull it out. After all this he still had one left that I couldn't get out. It came out much later and he told me it was almost an inch long.


    Marco,
    I didn't know you got injured until I read this today. Looks like you did a good job taking care of your injuries. Lots of good information you have given us about DIY sea urchin treatment. Good job and very informative post. I hope I never have that type of injury. Thank you for sharing such useful information and I hope you fully recover soon.
    hau

    I know this is an old post but back home in Hawaii if someone stepped on Vana, the large sharp brittle sea urchin, we where always advised to pee on it or put meat tenderizer or baking powder on the wound. If you could pull out the spines then great but they where very brittle and difficult to remove. Other home remedies included soaking in vinegar or beer. Be careful out there. :)

    I was stung by a vana in three fingers while paddling across the shallow inside reef at Crouching Lion (Oahu) and I had the black dots and swollen fingers for months.

    Quote from hank

    I was stung by a vana in three fingers while paddling across the shallow inside reef at Crouching Lion (Oahu) and I had the black dots and swollen fingers for months.


    I have been fortunate in that I have never been stung by Vana (knock on wood) but I have torn up my feet on the little white urchins while climbing out of the ocean on the rocks. We use to camp at the beach a lot and when any of the girls got Vana some of the guys would argue about who got to pee on it :laughing3: A friend of mine sat on Vana once, the vinegar is supposed to help dissolve the thorns, but if you sit on Vana you are constantly reminded that you did for along time. Hope your fingers are feeling better.

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