UMass Docs Save Mom, Son From Deadly Mushroom Poisoning

WORCESTER, MA — A mother and son from western Massachusetts survived a severe bout with toxic mushrooms thanks to a team of UMass Memorial doctors who worked on the relatively uncommon medical case.

Several weeks ago, Amherst resident Kam Look was picking vegetables at a friend's garden when she noticed a patch of white mushrooms growing near a wooded area. Look picked the mushrooms thinking they were the same type as edible ones found in Malaysia, where she is from.

Look took the mushrooms home to use in a meal. Before she started cooking, she used ginger to test if the fungus was toxic because ginger turns black when it comes into contact with toxins, son Kai Chen said.

But a few hours after eating the meal, Look began to get sick. Chen followed soon after. Both had symptoms similar to food poisoning, and didn't seek medical help until two days after eating the mushrooms. Doctors at Cooley Dickinson Hospital in Northampton realized there was something much more serious going on and transferred them to UMass Memorial.

By the time they got to Worcester, both Look and Chen were suffering from severe liver damage. Dr. Stephanie Carreiro, a UMass toxicology expert, located a supply of Legalon, an experimental drug that may reverse liver damage. The drug, which does not have FDA approval, had to be flown from Philadelphia to Worcester.

The drug worked for Chen, but not for Look, who was in worse shape. Doctors moved her to the top of the liver transplant list in a last effort to save her life — and it worked.

"The mom spent several days intubated in the ICU and was carefully cared for by specially trained transplant caregivers who used a complex array of medications to keep her stable," UMass Memorial said in a news release.

Both Chen and Look appeared together at a news conference Thursday at UMass Memorial in Worcester, thankful for the life-saving help they got from doctors.

Carreiro said the mom and son ate mushrooms from amanita fungus family, which contains some of the most toxic — and common in the U.S. — mushrooms found in nature.