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Tuesday, February 22, 2011

Most abnormal medical test results: A person having Blood alcohol of 0.55% but still alive


Victoria:
Na 174 (I think) in a very crispy elderly person. pCO2 of 20 in someone with muscular dystrophy and too much morphine on board.

Laura:
I've seen a Na of 107 before, highest K Ive seen is 8, highest Creatinine just under 3,000 and a Trop T of 17.

Cara:
wbc 55
neutro 52
a young women with atypical pneumonia.

Will:
I saw a guy in the royal with a trop T of 35, worse still it was about his fifth MI in six months, and the lowest Trop was 9, plus he didnt have renal failure contributing to the tropnin count.

I had a lady in AE who's sample was so lipaemic it was unmeasurable, we literally broke two of the labs very expensive UE analysers whcih caused chaos for the whole night... I remember taking the sample, there was about a half centimeter of fat visible floating on the top.

Tim:
Troponin of 960... 2 weeks post CABG... vein graft to LCx clotted off, clot propogated back up to the LM, then down the LAD... no renal failure... yes nine hundred and sixty.
Didn't survive...

Laura:
Neutrophil count of 0 in a patient with no known haematological problems, scared the bejeesus out of me as a a new house officer.

Tim:
Blood alcohol of 0.55%... chronic alcoholic...
The police didn't believe us that someone could be alive with a blood alcohol over 0.3, so we faxed the result to them... The patient was awake, alive and swearing at us.
The legal limit for driving in Australia is 0.05%.

Suzanne:
Our labs stop at the following -
K >10
Trop I >50
I've seen them both (different patients), and they survived

Other exciting ones...
Na 176 (dementia, NH resident)
Urea 72, Creatinine 860 (obstructed...)
Platelets 1 (ITP)
WCC 110 (CLL)
ABG pH 6.79 (DKA)



Please do share your experiences by writing a comment or sending an email at mdblogger20@gmail.com.

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