FW: [DYSPHAGIA] blue dye causing deaths? Really

[GuptaJ@sesahs.nsw.gov.au (Jai Gupta)]

Something to keep in mind..
Just a reminder recently one my elderly pt with dementia drank 1/2 a bottle
(about 25ml of blue food color(133) ingredient 2.1% dyestuff,
preservative(210) and water) nurses had left on the table along with
nilstat, ear drops and MRSA kit etc as he is MRSA + ..his pooh is still blue
and he is still alive and improving his general condition. 
This patient is a challenge, 2nd to glottic carcinoma he has had total
laryngectomy and recovered from fistulas - healed now. His insight is so
poor inspite of telling him not to put anything in his stoma ( ENT are
thinking of putting a voice prosthesis at some stage, so the trachy is out
...  and it is hard to convince our surgeon that this man need protection),
the other day our dietitian saw him pouring HEHP fluid and stuffing mashed
potatoes...he was going blue and breathless ...nurses had to dig out food
from is stoma ...he survived ...has anybody more challenging story than this
and would like to share... just make work lighter ...I joked with the nurse
.... the blue dye pooh should make their life easier as can be seen easily
(contrasts the cream ground) so can be cleaned urgently :-)))))))))
Jai Gupta M.Sc (S.H.) C.P.S.P.,M.S.P.A.
Manager, Speech Pathology Department
The Sutherland Hospital Caringbah
Taren Point 2229 NSW. Australia
Tel 602-95407111 Fax 602-9540 7717
Email: guptaJ@sesahs.nsw.gov.au

 

> This is from another list. Interesting
> 
> http://news.excite.com/news/r/001004/17/science-health-dye-dc
> 
> 
>   Food Dye Implicated in U.S. Patient Deaths
> 
> 
> 
>                             Updated 5:05 PM ET October 4, 2000
> 
>   BOSTON (Reuters) - A widely-used blue food dye may have
>   contributed to the deaths of three critically ill patients after it was
>   used to color the liquid food pumped into their stomachs,
>   according to a report in Thursday's New England Journal of
>   Medicine.
> 
>   The three had eaten food with FD&C blue dye No. 1 and their
>   skin and blood turned a bluish-green hours before they died, Dr.
>   James Maloney of the Medical College of Wisconsin told Reuters.
> 
>   A report on two of three cases originated in Denver and they are
>   reported in the Journal. The third case will be presented at a
>   conference in January.
> 
>   The dye, made from coal tar, is routinely added to the liquid to
>   help doctors see if any of the food is escaping from the stomach
>   and being inhaled. In healthy people, the dye never leaves the
>   digestive tract.
> 
>   But these cases involved patients who had digestive track tissues
>   being destroyed by sepsis, an infectious condition.
> 
>   Maloney and his colleagues said the damage apparently allowed
>   the dye to get into the bloodstream, causing a deadly drop in blood
>   pressure and an increase in acid levels in the body.
> 
>   One patient was a 54-year-old woman with heart failure. In 1995,
>   two days after her food was colored with the dye, her skin and
>   blood turned green and she died.
> 
>   The other victim described in the Journal was a one-year-old boy
>   with sepsis who died in 1998 of the same cause on the day his
>   skin, blood and urine turned blue.
> 
>   "Although both patients had serious underlying illnesses, their
>   condition was improving before they received the dye and turned
>   color," the researchers said.
> 
>   The third case involved an elderly woman from Wisconsin.
> 
>   Maloney said there have been other instances, none of them fatal,
>   where seriously-ill recipients of the dye have turned color, but the
>   incidents have been sporadic.
> 
>   The researcher said the dye is not dangerous to the vast majority
>   of people. Because it is only in seriously ill patients that it might
>   be a remote threat, as a precaution, Maloney said "we're trying to
>   convince people not to use it in any hospitalized patients."
> 
>   The dye, manufactured by a variety of companies, was approved
>   in the 1960s by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, which
>   performed other safety tests early in the 1980s. Those experiments
>   showed that the dye was safe and the body didn't absorb it. But
>   those tests were performed on healthy animals, the Maloney team
>   noted.
> 
> 
> 
> bheint@execpc.com
> 
> 
> 
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