Dog lick costs leg, toes, fingers

A woman is rebuilding her life from losing all her toes, fingers and a leg after being licked by a dog.

Julie McKenna from Mildura in Victoria was rushed to the Royal Adelaide Hospital last year after her small terrier licked a superficial burn on her left foot.

It sent her into septic shock, weeks later.

While the former nurse says her case is rare, she thinks people need to be careful around dogs and cats, especially where there is broken skin.

"I mean you see dogs licking kids on the face and things like that, I mean it's just one of those million-in-one chances, it's like the bird flu, you know, how did it hop from bird to human?" she said.

"Definitely changed my life, it's changed my life in every aspect, having no fingers and no, well amputated leg and half a foot, it's everything, you have to think twice about how to do things."

Burns specialist Dr John Greenwood says pet owners need to be careful.

"Dog bites, dog licks, they're never benign, they're always potentially horrendously infective."