ABSTRACT
Venom from Bothrops snake produces severe local symptoms on the envenomed victim, such as hemorrhage, edema and myonecrosis. The latter is perhaps the most important of all, since antivenom therapy is not effective for it, even when antivenom is injected only a few minutes after the accident. In this work, mice weighing 18-20 g (n = 5) were inoculated with 70 micrograms Bothrops jararacussu venom in 0.1 ml PBS in the gastrocnemius muscle. Mice were sacrificed using ether after 1, 12 hours, 3, 5, 7 days and 2, 3, 5, 6 weeks after the injection of the venom to obtain gastrocnemius muscles. They were fixed with Bouin's solution and stained using Hematoxylin--Eosin and Mason's trichromic stain was applied to visualize collagen fibers. Results showed that inflammatory reaction was evident after a few minutes of the venom injection, which was not evident after 6 weeks. Muscular fiber necrosis reached its highest level on the seventh day. Even thought regeneration of muscular fibers was important, they never reached the size of the control. We conclude that Bothrops jararacussu venom causes severe necrosis on muscle fibers with partial recovery, showing low hemorrhage and abundance of granulation tissue. This points that not all fibers were regenerated, which can be seen as a functional sequel for injured muscle.