'There's a bat in my mouth’: Richmond doctor's bat nightmare goes viral

RICHMOND, Va. — A Richmond doctor woke up last week to find a bat trying to get into her mouth — and her viral story carries an important warning for anyone who encounters a bat inside their home.

Dr. Krista Edelman, a gastroenterologist who lives off Grove Avenue in Richmond, was asleep in her nearly 100-year-old home when the encounter happened. She has since shared her experience on Instagram, where it has been shared more than 33,000 times.

"So brace yourself, this is a bat PSA," Edelman said in the video.

Edelman said she was dreaming when she first sensed something near her face.

"So I was dreaming, and in my dream there was a cute little field mouse. This is pretty vivid, the whole thing. A little field mouse trying to get into my mouth," Edelman said.

As she began to wake up, she reached toward her mouth and grabbed something she said initially felt like a tulip.

"And then I felt on its back really kind of coarse, short hair, and when that happened, I realized that was not a mouse," Edelman said. "I screamed, and I was screaming repeatedly, something to the extent of like, 'There's a bat in my mouth. The bat is trying to get in my mouth.'"

Edelman quickly researched what to do and learned she should try to catch the bat rather than kill it, so it could be tested for rabies. She then called a friend who is an infectious disease doctor for guidance on whether she needed to seek a rabies vaccine immediately.

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"He was anxious, and he's not a very anxious person. So when he got anxious, I started to get anxious, and what I didn't fully realize at the time was that the closer to the brain the exposure, the markedly accelerated risk of transmission," Edelman said.

Her friend urged her to get treated as soon as possible. Edelman went to the emergency department at St. Mary's Hospital, where she works, and was seen by Dr. Adam Landsee, the assistant medical director for the ER.

Landsee said anyone who wakes up to find a bat in their home should take the situation seriously.

"If you wake up in a room with a bat in your room or in your kid's room or in your house, you kind of have to assume the worst," Landsee said.

He said the small size of bat teeth makes it difficult to know whether a bite occurred.

"Bat teeth are very small and you don't know if you've been bitten or not, and with rabies being essentially fatal, they need to be treated," Landsee said.

Dr. Julia Murphy, the state's public health veterinarian with the Virginia Department of Health, said submissions of bats for rabies testing are up this year compared to previous years, though the number of bats that have tested positive is not up.

Murphy recommends trying to trap the bat, as Edelman did, and then contacting your local health department for guidance. Local health departments can turn around bat rabies testing in roughly 48 hours. If the test comes back negative, a vaccine will not be needed.

"What I would encourage is a very prompt contact with local health department or animal control services for guidance," Murphy said.

Edelman recently learned the bat that tried to get into her mouth tested negative for rabies. She said she shared her story to help others who might find themselves in a similar situation.

"I was compelled to put it out there because I was a little humbled. Like I, again, grew up in rural Hanover. Like I think I know the basics of things, and I was humbled about how I didn't really know what to do in that situation," Edelman said.

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