Kauai resident suffers flesh-eating bacteria infection

A Kauai man is fighting to overcome a case of rare flesh-eating bacteria that have already attacked his legs, back and abdomen.

Lihue resident John Stem was found unconscious by his mother in his apartment Saturday morning and has been in the intensive care unit at Wilcox Memorial Hospital ever since.

Janice Bond said her son, 49, underwent seven hours of surgery for necrotizing faciitis between Saturday and Monday, during which doctors cut away dead tissue, leaving muscles and arteries.

She said the disease is continuing to spread to his chest, but there are signs that he is improving.

"They have worked very diligently, 24 hours," she said of the staff. "The breathing tube was removed (on Wednesday). He is awake and kind of feisty."

Stem is waiting to be transferred to Oahu for reconstructive surgery, but there are no hospital rooms available, she said.

"It’s very important that he go there because we kept him alive this long," Bond said.

She said her son’s condition requires specialized treatment. She said Stem was coherent, but that he didn’t know the extent of his injuries.

A Wilcox Hospital spokeswoman confirmed that Stem was in stable condition, but did not know whether there were problems getting him transferred to an Oahu hospital and didn’t have further information.

Necrotizing faciitis is caused by Group A streptococcus, a bacterium often found in the throat and skin that usually leads to strep throat. When the bacterium gets into the blood, muscle or the lungs, it can cause necrotizing faciitis, a fast-moving disease that destroys tissue, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The disease kills about 25 percent of patients, but early treatment may reduce the risk of death.

Health experts recommend preventing the spread of the disease by washing hands, keeping wounds clean and watching for possible signs of infection such as redness, swelling, drainage and pain at the wound.

Those with signs of an infected wound should seek medical care immediately, especially if the wound is accompanied by fever.

Janice Okubo, spokeswoman at the state Department of Health, didn’t immediately have statistics on flesh-eating bacteria in Hawaii, but said it is rare.

Still, several people have died in the islands after contracting the disease. Kurt Sonoda, a popular teacher at Pearl City High School, died of the disease in 2009.

Bond said she doesn’t know where her son, a sales agent for Terminix, got the infection, but believes he might have come across it last week when he was busy doing site inspections during the storms on Kauai.

"I want people to know about this staph A and that they should take care of any cuts or small minor things … where the bacteria can enter the system," Bond said. "People need to be aware."