Metabolism
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Poisoned by unripe ackee fruit
HG gave a small dinner party, and in honour of one of the guests who was Jamaican,
prepared a traditional Jamaican dish, ackee with rice and salt fish, as well
as a number of other dishes.
Unfortunately, she had used unripe ackee fruit.
Only two of the guests ate any of ackee dish, and about an hour after the meal both became unconscious. An ambulance was called and they were taken to hospital. Emergency measurement of their blood glucose showed that it was dangerously low: 1.9 mmol /L in one case and 2.1 mmol /L in the other.
What is the normal range of blood glucose?
What emergency treatment should they received?
The normal range of blood glucose is 3.5 - 5.5 mmol /L,
but may rise to 8 mmol /L after a meal.
The obvious emergency treatment would be intravenous glucose
Why does a very low blood glucose concentration lead to loss of consciousness?
The brain is more or less completely reliant on glucose as its metabolic fuel, except in prolonged starvation, and the brain accounts for about 20% of whole body resting energy expenditure. Most of this energy expenditure is involved in transporting sodium and potassium ions across nerve membranes, against their concentration gradient, to maintain electrical activity. The sodium pump (in the brain and all other tissues) accounts for about 22% of whole body resting energy expenditure.