Setting: 40,000 years ago, late middle palaeolithic Neandertal culture. This is backstory, events that are discussed in the story, but they happened maybe a couple of years before.
One character, a young man, dies of complications of a hunting accident (thrown by a large animal, per the kinds of injuries found in the Neandertal fossil record). For story/characterisation reasons, his death is traumatic for the rest of the community, particularly for his (then) adolescent younger brother who witnesses the accident when he's first learning how to hunt. Their mother dies shortly afterwards, which also affects the younger brother.
I need to get the details right for both deaths.
The injury I have in mind for the young man is an open fracture of the radius and/or ulna which becomes infected and he dies of sepsis in the following days. I need to know the details of how the illness progresses and what happens to him before he dies. For example I've seen photos of people in hospital with sepsis that have blackened limbs that require amputation. How would this pan out with no medical intervention at all including no painkillers? The people in the story have only the most basic knowledge of first aid and herbal medicine and have no idea how to help him besides keeping him warm by the fire and sitting with him. So from the time they carry him back from the scene of the accident (he'd be carried on someone's shoulders, fireman style - they live in a cave that's dry and gets the sun around midday, with a well kept hearth, animal skins for warmth) until he dies, what's likely to happen? What are the timescales involved? And what actually would kill him - multiple organ failure? Or without medical intervention would he die of the sepsis before it gets to that stage? Presumably people did survive sepsis sometimes without medical intervention otherwise the body wouldn't have evolved to respond that way.
Are there any other fractures/injuries that he's likely to have also sustained from being thrown by a large animal if he's landed in such a way as to fracture the radius/ulna? Any other possible complications of the open fracture besides sepsis?
Regarding the mother's death, this doesn't have to be within an exact timescale as long as it's close enough after her son's death for the other people in the community to link the two deaths, i.e. they interpret it that she never got over seeing her son die like that and the heartbreak and shock of it killed her. I've heard that there's a thing where after a trauma/traumatic bereavement there's a higher risk of dying of a heart attack, but I'm not keen on the death being heart related as heart disease is rare in hunter-gatherer populations. I'd like to give some hint of what caused her death if possible, as opposed to just having her randomly drop dead, although it would be a hint as told by her people a couple of years later, e.g. she had (symptom or symptoms) then died. It'd probably work better story wise if it's something that makes her slowly get weaker and then die.
One character, a young man, dies of complications of a hunting accident (thrown by a large animal, per the kinds of injuries found in the Neandertal fossil record). For story/characterisation reasons, his death is traumatic for the rest of the community, particularly for his (then) adolescent younger brother who witnesses the accident when he's first learning how to hunt. Their mother dies shortly afterwards, which also affects the younger brother.
I need to get the details right for both deaths.
The injury I have in mind for the young man is an open fracture of the radius and/or ulna which becomes infected and he dies of sepsis in the following days. I need to know the details of how the illness progresses and what happens to him before he dies. For example I've seen photos of people in hospital with sepsis that have blackened limbs that require amputation. How would this pan out with no medical intervention at all including no painkillers? The people in the story have only the most basic knowledge of first aid and herbal medicine and have no idea how to help him besides keeping him warm by the fire and sitting with him. So from the time they carry him back from the scene of the accident (he'd be carried on someone's shoulders, fireman style - they live in a cave that's dry and gets the sun around midday, with a well kept hearth, animal skins for warmth) until he dies, what's likely to happen? What are the timescales involved? And what actually would kill him - multiple organ failure? Or without medical intervention would he die of the sepsis before it gets to that stage? Presumably people did survive sepsis sometimes without medical intervention otherwise the body wouldn't have evolved to respond that way.
Are there any other fractures/injuries that he's likely to have also sustained from being thrown by a large animal if he's landed in such a way as to fracture the radius/ulna? Any other possible complications of the open fracture besides sepsis?
Regarding the mother's death, this doesn't have to be within an exact timescale as long as it's close enough after her son's death for the other people in the community to link the two deaths, i.e. they interpret it that she never got over seeing her son die like that and the heartbreak and shock of it killed her. I've heard that there's a thing where after a trauma/traumatic bereavement there's a higher risk of dying of a heart attack, but I'm not keen on the death being heart related as heart disease is rare in hunter-gatherer populations. I'd like to give some hint of what caused her death if possible, as opposed to just having her randomly drop dead, although it would be a hint as told by her people a couple of years later, e.g. she had (symptom or symptoms) then died. It'd probably work better story wise if it's something that makes her slowly get weaker and then die.