Maggot Therapy? Seems It Works

Not for the faint of heart, but it seems that this type of therapy is working so well that it might be covered by insurance.

This therapy is in fact already approved as treatment for people with nasty bed sores, chronic post-surgical wounds and diabetic foot ulcers, according to a recent article on MSNBC.

Here's how it works. Specially-prepared maggots are use to feed on sick tissue so that healthy tissue can move in thus avoiding an infection. I guess we had heard about this treatment being used years ago, back in the 30's, but once antibiotics came along, out went the maggots. Well they're back.

With infections now resistant to some antibiotics, maggots looks to be useful again. So much so that the recently the American Medical Assoc. and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services addressed the issue of reimbursement for medicinal maggots.

The article points out that in the U.S. there are now more than 1,000 therapists using maggot therapy.