Arizona cancer survivor, friends contract botulism after eating fermented swordfish

PHOENIX (AZFamily) — A woman who survived two different cancers as a child is recovering from a rare case of botulism after eating homemade fermented swordfish.

Trinity Peterson-Mayes, 24, and two of her friends were hospitalized last month after eating the fish after her birthday celebration.

Peterson-Mayes now uses a walker to move around.

“I used to go on two-hour walks every day before all this,” she said. “(Now) It’s maybe 15 minutes.”

Peterson-Mayes said she only ate about a quarter-sized piece of a friend’s homemade fermented swordfish.

“All of a sudden the next day my throat was feeling weird. I wasn’t sure what was going on,” she said.

She couldn’t swallow liquids and choked while drinking coffee. Peterson-Mayes went to a Valley hospital and spent three days waiting for a diagnosis. Her condition worsened with double vision and heavy arms and legs. She described her symptoms as stroke-like.

“I felt like I was just deteriorating and nobody’s doing anything,” she said.

Peterson-Mayes then went to St. Joseph’s Hospital in Phoenix and asked for every test available. She was diagnosed with botulism in just a few hours.

“Basically it’s a life-threatening disease caused by the neurotoxin produced by a bacteria,” she said.

Dr. Nassim Matin, a neurocritical care physician at Barrow Neurological Institute who treated Peterson-Mayes, said botulism is caused in some cases by poorly fermented foods.

“It is pretty rare to have food wound botulism. So the antitoxin is not readily available in all the hospitals,” Matin said.

The antitoxin had to be flown in to Saint Joseph’s from out of state for Peterson-Mayes and her two friends, who were also hospitalized for botulism.

Collin Niesen said he was incorrectly diagnosed with allergies by a different doctor.

“I felt really weak. When I was in the hospital I couldn’t get myself up. I was in bed pretty much and I had the feeding tube,” Niesen said.

Once they received the medicine, they all started feeling better.

“It became easier to breathe,” Peterson-Mayes said.

Their health is still not at 100%. Dr. Matin said months to a year to make a complete recovery.

“It’s definitely made me more grateful for the things you don’t appreciate once it’s taken away from you, that’s for sure,” she said.

Peterson-Mayes has been advocating for her health since she was a child, when she beat two different cancers.

“My capability to process and cope with situations like this is probably a lot more developed than I’d like to admit,” she said.

Peterson-Mayes and Niesen both have GoFundMe fundraisers to help with medical costs.

You can donate to Person-Mayes’ fundraiser by clicking here. To help Niesen, click here.

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