Medicinski vjesnik, Vol. 41 No. (1-2), 2009.
Case report
Acute alcohol intoxication
Vinko Čatipović
Marija Čatipović
Abstract
Alcoholism is accompanied by the number of physical, neurological, psychiatric and social complications. Medical journals point to the relation between acute intoxication and head traumas or neurosurgical complications, but the relation between acute intoxication and other kind of complications is also possible. The paper presents a patient who was admitted to the Department of Psychiatry with a diagnosis of acute (alcoholic) intoxication. Anamnestic and heteroanamnestic data were superficial and inaccurate, and no signs of head trauma or acute intracranial processes were evident at the admission. Development of neurological symptoms and consciousness disorder were noticed during the observation, afterwhich an urgent neuroradiological treatment and neurosurgical intervention followed. The warning that other diseases can sometimes be hidden behind clinical manifestations caused by alcohol consumption was already noticed in the works of "the old" psychiatrists (Bleurler), who pointed out the risks of their misdiagnosis, as some groups of symptoms can get "an alcoholic hue". The aim of this paper is to point out differential diagnostics and its difficulties in treatment of acute intoxication, as well as dangers of disguising independent pathological states as acute inebriation.
Keywords
Alcoholic intoxication - complications
Hrčak ID:
191671
URI
Publication date:
1.12.2009.
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