Can tetanus be fatal?

Written by Li Jin Quan
General Surgery
Updated on March 05, 2025
00:00
00:00

Firstly, it must be acknowledged that if a patient with tetanus does not receive timely treatment, it can be fatal. When tetanus infection occurs, the early symptoms mainly include dizziness, headache, fatigue, loss of appetite, weak chewing, sore jaw muscles, or some heightened reflexes, or muscle tension. As tetanus worsens, it can manifest as typical clinical symptoms, mainly lockjaw, difficulty opening the mouth, sardonic smile, stiff neck, opisthotonos, and in severe cases, difficulty breathing, respiratory arrest, and even cardiac arrest. If emergency treatment is not administered promptly, the patient can die.

Other Voices

doctor image
home-news-image
Written by Zhang Peng
General Surgery
1min 7sec home-news-image

Can I breastfeed after getting a tetanus shot?

Current research indicates that lactating women are not contraindicated for tetanus vaccination; the main contraindication is allergy to the tetanus vaccine. Generally, if there are high-risk factors for tetanus infection, timely wound debridement and care should be performed, followed by early administration of passive immunization with tetanus vaccine. Generally, tetanus antitoxin can be used based on the results of a skin test. If the skin test result is strongly positive, its use should be avoided, and tetanus immunoglobulin should be chosen instead. The effective metabolic period of tetanus immunoglobulin is about three weeks. If high-risk factors for infection still exist beyond this time limit, timely enhancement of immune therapy should be considered. Regarding the tetanus vaccine, it is generally advised that the earlier it is administered, the better, as early administration can neutralize the tetanus toxin already present in the blood. However, if the tetanus toxin has already bound to nerve cells, treatment becomes relatively difficult.

doctor image
home-news-image
Written by Li Jin Quan
General Surgery
36sec home-news-image

Does tetanus cause fever?

When tetanus occurs, early symptoms mainly include dizziness, headache, fatigue, decreased appetite, weak chewing, sore jaw muscles, or tense facial muscles. Some cases show exaggerated reflexes or muscle tension. Generally, tetanus has its typical manifestations, such as difficulty in opening the mouth, risus sardonicus (a sardonic smile), opisthotonus (arching of the back), and stiff neck. In clinical practice, a few cases may even have a fever. Therefore, fever in tetanus is only seen in individual cases.

doctor image
home-news-image
Written by Ai Bing Quan
General Surgery
44sec home-news-image

What will happen with tetanus?

In clinical settings, tetanus is a type of surgical-specific infectious disease caused by the infiltration of Clostridium tetani through human skin, mucous membranes, or wounds. Tetanus toxin is a true anaerobic bacterium that thrives in oxygen-deprived environments and is highly resistant to environmental conditions. Clostridium tetani mainly produces tetanus toxin and tetanolysin, which can cause whole-body muscle spasms, including facial muscle spasms and difficulty opening the mouth. It can also lead to persistent spasms of the respiratory muscles and diaphragm, causing respiratory arrest and, in severe cases, can result in patient death.

doctor image
home-news-image
Written by Xu Jun Hui
General Surgery
43sec home-news-image

Can I take a bath after getting a tetanus shot?

It's not recommended to take a bath immediately after receiving a tetanus shot. First, the wound requiring a tetanus shot may either be deep, heavily contaminated, or relatively large. After receiving a tetanus shot in the buttocks or the deltoid muscle of the upper arm, it is essential to enhance wound dressing changes and keep the wound dry, which is why bathing is not advised. If it's just a simple tetanus injection site, it can generally be exposed to water a few hours later. However, other wounds on the body should be kept dry. Therefore, it is better to take a bath when wounds on other parts of the body have healed well to avoid worsening infections and delaying healing.

doctor image
home-news-image
Written by Zhang Peng
General Surgery
48sec home-news-image

How long does a tetanus shot last?

Regarding how long a tetanus shot lasts, it depends on which type has been administered. Generally, there are two types of tetanus injections: tetanus immunoglobulin and tetanus antitoxin. Typically, doctors perform a skin test before administering the tetanus antitoxin; if the patient has a positive skin test and cannot tolerate desensitization treatment, tetanus immunoglobulin can be administered instead. These two medications have different metabolic times and their preventive effects vary. The metabolic time for tetanus antitoxin is generally one week, whereas for tetanus immunoglobulin, it can last about 28 days. Therefore, how long a tetanus shot lasts depends on the specific circumstances of the patient’s injection.