Emergency physicians need no reminders to be vigilant for accidental carbon monoxide poisoning. Because its earliest symptoms are vague and mimic a viral illness, carbon monoxide has been coined “the great masquerader.” Missing the diagnosis risks continued exposure in patients discharged back to the same environment and represents a lost opportunity to identify other victims. In this issue, La...

INTRODUCTION Carbon monoxide (CO) is a colorless, odorless gas produced as a by-product of incomplete combustion, and a common source is the fuel used for heating water in homes. The clinical presentation of CO poisoning may be mild, moderate, or severe. CASE PRESENTATION This paper describes carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning in a 15-year-old child who suffered from severe cardiopulmonary compro...

Carbon monoxide intoxication is a well-known cause of hypoxic injury primarily to the central nervous system and myocardium, but the bowel may be also vulnerable. Patients succumbing to carbon monoxide poisoning are usually considered unsuitable for organ procurement and they are routinely rejected in many transplant centers. As the organ supply is by far insufficient to meet the needs of patie...

Carbon monoxide poisoning during pregnancy is a rare and potentially serious condition. Fetal complications are uncommon, related to anoxic lesions. The severity of these complications does not depend on the level of maternal COHb. We report the case of a 22-year-old pregnant woman who at 30 weeks of gestation had carbon monoxide poisoning secondary to a fire in her home, complicated by cardiac...

Alexithymia refers to a person's inability to identify and describe feelings. We present a patient who developed alexithymia after carbon monoxide poisoning following a suicide attempt by burning charcoal in an enclosed space. Brain computed tomography revealed bilateral globus pallidus hypoxic lesions. Because of the time frame and the presence of brain structural lesions, the alexithymia in t...

During the acute stage of carbon monoxide poisoning, diffusion MR images obtained at b=1000 s/mm2 revealed high signal intensity lesions in the white matter, consistent with restricted diffusion. Low apparent diffusion coefficient values (0.18-0.34 x 10(-3) mm2/s) were noted in the affected white matter regions. Follow-up MR imaging performed 16 days later revealed disappearance of white matter...

In view of the tragic fire at a nightclub in the city of Santa Maria, Brazil, which culminated in the sudden death of 232 young people, we decided to review the literature regarding smoke inhalation injury caused by enclosed-space fires, which can be divided into direct thermal damage, carbon monoxide poisoning, and cyanide poisoning. Such injuries often call for immediate orotracheal intubatio...

conclusions acute poisoning in children is a serious preventable cause of hospital admissions. it is one of the differential diagnoses in patients with sudden onset of neurological, alimentary, respiratory symptoms and signs, who are visited at the emergency department. parental awareness and education about keeping potential poisoning agents safely is essential to reduce apc in children. backg...

Carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning is common in modern society, resulting in significant morbidity and mortality in the United States annually. Over the past two decades, sufficient information has been published about carbon monoxide poisoning in the medical literature to draw firm conclusions about many aspects of the pathophysiology, diagnosis, and clinical management of the syndrome, along with...