Grandparents and grandchildren poisoned after eating wild mushrooms

Ho Chi Minh City: Grandparents went into the forest to pick wild mushrooms, and together with their 10-year-old grandson, prepared a dish with rice, then showed symptoms of poisoning and fell into a coma.

Three people were taken to the emergency room, then the boy was transferred to Children's Hospital 2, and the grandparents were transferred to Cho Ray Hospital.

On the evening of June 21, Dr. Nguyen Van Loc, Head of the Department of Intensive Care and Anti-Poisoning, Children's Hospital 2, said that the child was transferred to the hospital in Tay Ninh on June 9 in a coma, with grade 3 hepatic encephalopathy and high liver enzymes of approximately 16,000 U/L (normally about 40 U/L).

Relatives said that although this type of mushroom grows in the forest, it is popular in the locality, and is called chicken egg or goose egg mushroom by locals. During the rainy season, when the mushrooms grow, people go into the forest to collect them to cook porridge or stir-fry with squash.

The doctor diagnosed the patient with poisoning possibly due to eating poisonous mushrooms. The child had to be put on a ventilator, have continuous blood filtration, receive plasma exchange, and receive drugs to support the liver and prevent brain swelling.

After more than 10 days of treatment, the child has been weaned off the ventilator, stopped dialysis, has improved consciousness, liver enzymes have decreased to approximately 100 U/L, and continues to be monitored and treated. The grandparents are still being treated at Cho Ray.

Tay Ninh has recently seen many cases of poisoning after eating wild mushrooms. Children's Hospital 2 is also treating a 22-month-old girl with mushroom poisoning, in a similar condition to the boy above. Earlier this month, a family of three, including a husband, wife and daughter, were also hospitalized due to poisoning after eating mushrooms. The couple have since passed away, and the daughter is recovering.

The type of mushroom the children ate was poisoned. Photo: Provided by the hospital — The type of mushroom the patients ate that caused poisoning. Photo: *Provided by the hospital*

Receiving consecutive cases of mass poisoning due to eating mushrooms, doctors at Children's Hospital 2 recommend that because it is impossible to distinguish between healthy and poisonous mushrooms (if only based on shape and color), people absolutely should not pick wild mushrooms to eat.

The world currently records more than 5,000 types of mushrooms, of which about 100 are poisonous - difficult to distinguish from non-poisonous ones. The process of emergency and treatment of patients with mushroom poisoning is very expensive, the mortality rate is very high (over 50%). Medical history shows many cases of whole families dying after eating poisonous mushrooms.

Signs of poisoning appear late after eating from 6 to 40 hours, usually 12-18 hours. Patients have nausea, vomiting, continuous diarrhea like cholera, lasting 1-2 days, causing dehydration and electrolyte disturbances, circulatory collapse, little or no urine. Severe cases cause hepatitis, fatigue, deep coma, bleeding in many places (under the skin, mucous membranes, blood in urine...), multiple organ failure and death.

People should only eat cultivated mushrooms, knowing for sure the species and origin. In case of accidentally eating a suspected poisonous mushroom, they should go to the nearest medical facility for timely treatment.

American Italy

Source link