-
Tidsskr. Nor. Laegeforen. · Jan 2008
Case Reports[An 83-year-old woman with coma and severe hypernatremia].
- Trond Engjom and Odd Kildahl-Andersen.
- Medisinsk avdeling, Hålogalandssykehuset Harstad, 9480 Harstad. trond.engjom@helse-bergen.no
- Tidsskr. Nor. Laegeforen. 2008 Jan 31; 128 (3): 316-7.
BackgroundSeveral cases of hypernatremia due to salt intoxication have been described. Paediatric patients and individuals with dementia or mental illness are those most commonly affected. It is a condition with a poor prognosis and a high mortality rate.Material And MethodWe present an elderly, demented woman who was admitted with coma and elevated serum sodium (223 mmol/L). Recent literature on the condition has been reviewed.Results And InterpretationOn the basis of elevated serum sodium and urine sodium, normovolemia and normal diuresis, we concluded that hypernatremia was caused by salt intoxication. Our patient died a few hours after admittance. Recommended treatment is to maintain adequate diuresis with a loop diuretic, to and replace the ongoing fluid loss. Haemodialysis is an alternative if diuresis is inadequate. There is no consensus regarding type of replacement fluid or optimal rate of fluid replacement for hypernatremia due to salt intoxication.
Notes
Knowledge, pearl, summary or comment to share?You can also include formatting, links, images and footnotes in your notes
- Simple formatting can be added to notes, such as
*italics*,_underline_or**bold**. - Superscript can be denoted by
<sup>text</sup>and subscript<sub>text</sub>. - Numbered or bulleted lists can be created using either numbered lines
1. 2. 3., hyphens-or asterisks*. - Links can be included with:
[my link to pubmed](http://pubmed.com) - Images can be included with:
 - For footnotes use
[^1](This is a footnote.)inline. - Or use an inline reference
[^1]to refer to a longer footnote elseweher in the document[^1]: This is a long footnote..