Diabetes
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Twenty-four chronic alcohol abusers hospitalized during a twenty-seven-month period were suspected of having "alcoholic ketoacidosis" because they had ketonuria or ketonemia with little or no glucosuria. Twenty-one had moderate or severe ketosis, with plasma 3-hydroxybutyrate of 5.2 to 22.5 mmol/L. Fifteen of this group were not diabetic, while six were later found to have mild postprandial hyperglycemia without glycosuria. ⋯ Four patients were treated with insulin and four with NaHCO3 solutions. In retrospect, the need for either of these treatments was not clear. Two of the twenty-four patients died, one from circulatory failure secondary to hemorrhage and the other from pulmonary edema, but no patient died because of ketoacidosis per se.