An Oregon woman became infected with a flesh-eating disease after she fell off her bike in mid-June.
Kylie Marble, a 21-year-old college student, was playing a game of bike tag with her family on the Banks-Veronia State Trail when she fell on the paved road and cut her knee, according to the New York Daily News. But the innocent wound resulted in a rare, flesh-eating rare bacteria entering her body and feasting on her muscles.
Doctors at Oregon Health & Science University's hospital almost amputated one of Marble's legs.
"They could do that if they needed to, to save her life, of course," Marble's mom told ABC News.
Almost a month and nine-surgeries later, Marble is on her way to a slow recovery. She admits it may not have been a good idea to play bike tag when she was with her family on Father's Day, June 15.
"I kind of knew from the beginning. It wasn't the most genius idea," she told the station. "I wasn't really wanting to play the game."
"I knew it was a bad idea," her mother added.
When Marble fell she received stiches at the hospital and was sent home. But that night her thigh started to swell and she went back to the hospital. Next thing Kylie knew, she had to be sedated and did not wake up for a week.
Doctors determined that Marble contracted necrotizing fasciitis, a fast-spreading bacterial infection that attacks soft tissue, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The "flesh-eating infection" sickens about 650-800 people each year in the U.S.
It took nine operations for doctors to defeat the rabid infection. But Marble will need more surgeries to reconstruct her leg and physical therapy, according to ABC News.
"I'm blessed to be here," Marble told the station.
