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Emergency Measurement of Stat, Timed, Serum Ethanol Levels for Medical Management
Author(s) -
Senior John R.,
Sloan Bruce P.
Publication year - 1981
Publication title -
alcoholism: clinical and experimental research
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.267
H-Index - 153
eISSN - 1530-0277
pISSN - 0145-6008
DOI - 10.1111/j.1530-0277.1981.tb04857.x
Subject(s) - ethanol , medicine , incidence (geometry) , urea nitrogen , alcohol , population , urea , emergency department , emergency medicine , medical emergency , chemistry , environmental health , biochemistry , psychiatry , creatinine , physics , optics
Because of a general impression that a substantial proportion of emergency medical problems requiring treatment or hospitalization was caused by unsuspected alcohol consumption, a study to question that impression was done on a population of urban emergency service patients. We evaluated blood samples taken from these patients for routine determinations for many reasons other than suspicion of alcohol use or abuse. Abnormalities in results of serum ethanol concentrations were found more frequently than abnormalities of concurrently determined serum electrolytes, urea nitrogen, or glucose. The frequency of abnormalities found was ethanol, 42%; carbon dioxide, 35%; glucose, 34%; chloride, 32%, sodium, 21%; potassium, 20%; and urea nitrogen, 13%. The high incidence of serum ethanol elevations in such hospital emergency service patients and the considerable potential usefulness of ethanol levels in diagnosis and management of a wide variety of medical problems suggest that determinations of stat, timed, serum ethanol concentrations are often indicated as an emergency study for urban populations.