A rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury

BACKGROUND: Self-injection of elemental mercury is a rare finding especially in healthy people who are mentally sound. Early detection and removal of mercury from the body by chelation and physical removal of a stored injected site is required to prevent long term toxicity. CASE PRESENTATION: A 15 y...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Thanuja Nilushi Priyangika, Singankutti Mudalige, Karunarathna, W. G. S. G., Liyanage, Isurujith, Gunawardana, Methsala, Dissanayake, Buddini, Udumalgala, Sumeda, Rosa, Chamith, Samarasinghe, Thilina, Wijesinghe, Pravin, Kulatunga, Aruna
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2016
Materias:
Case Report
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4807590/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27012667
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13104-016-1992-8
_version_ 1782423402947018752
author Thanuja Nilushi Priyangika, Singankutti Mudalige
Karunarathna, W. G. S. G.
Liyanage, Isurujith
Gunawardana, Methsala
Dissanayake, Buddini
Udumalgala, Sumeda
Rosa, Chamith
Samarasinghe, Thilina
Wijesinghe, Pravin
Kulatunga, Aruna
author_facet Thanuja Nilushi Priyangika, Singankutti Mudalige
Karunarathna, W. G. S. G.
Liyanage, Isurujith
Gunawardana, Methsala
Dissanayake, Buddini
Udumalgala, Sumeda
Rosa, Chamith
Samarasinghe, Thilina
Wijesinghe, Pravin
Kulatunga, Aruna
author_sort Thanuja Nilushi Priyangika, Singankutti Mudalige
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Self-injection of elemental mercury is a rare finding especially in healthy people who are mentally sound. Early detection and removal of mercury from the body by chelation and physical removal of a stored injected site is required to prevent long term toxicity. CASE PRESENTATION: A 15 year old previously healthy girl presented with an acute febrile illness with a generalized maculopapular skin rash for 3 days with a preceding history of self-injection of mercury to both her forearms. This was an imitating experimental act influenced by a movie and she was mentally sound. Very high whole blood mercury levels, x-rays of the forearms and histology confirmed mercury poisoning. CONCLUSION: Self-injection of elemental mercury can also occur in mentally sound people and rapid diagnosis and decontamination is required. This also signifies the importance of imposing limitations for visual media which could misguide minors and lead those to imitate and cause serious self-harm.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-4807590
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2016
publisher BioMed Central
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-48075902016-03-25 A rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury Thanuja Nilushi Priyangika, Singankutti Mudalige Karunarathna, W. G. S. G. Liyanage, Isurujith Gunawardana, Methsala Dissanayake, Buddini Udumalgala, Sumeda Rosa, Chamith Samarasinghe, Thilina Wijesinghe, Pravin Kulatunga, Aruna BMC Res Notes Case Report BACKGROUND: Self-injection of elemental mercury is a rare finding especially in healthy people who are mentally sound. Early detection and removal of mercury from the body by chelation and physical removal of a stored injected site is required to prevent long term toxicity. CASE PRESENTATION: A 15 year old previously healthy girl presented with an acute febrile illness with a generalized maculopapular skin rash for 3 days with a preceding history of self-injection of mercury to both her forearms. This was an imitating experimental act influenced by a movie and she was mentally sound. Very high whole blood mercury levels, x-rays of the forearms and histology confirmed mercury poisoning. CONCLUSION: Self-injection of elemental mercury can also occur in mentally sound people and rapid diagnosis and decontamination is required. This also signifies the importance of imposing limitations for visual media which could misguide minors and lead those to imitate and cause serious self-harm. BioMed Central 2016-03-25 /pmc/articles/PMC4807590/ /pubmed/27012667 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13104-016-1992-8 Text en © Thanuja Nilushi Priyangika et al. 2016 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
spellingShingle Case Report
Thanuja Nilushi Priyangika, Singankutti Mudalige
Karunarathna, W. G. S. G.
Liyanage, Isurujith
Gunawardana, Methsala
Dissanayake, Buddini
Udumalgala, Sumeda
Rosa, Chamith
Samarasinghe, Thilina
Wijesinghe, Pravin
Kulatunga, Aruna
A rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury
title A rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury
title_full A rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury
title_fullStr A rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury
title_full_unstemmed A rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury
title_short A rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury
title_sort rare case of self-injection of elemental mercury
topic Case Report
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4807590/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27012667
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13104-016-1992-8
work_keys_str_mv AT thanujanilushipriyangikasingankuttimudalige ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT karunarathnawgsg ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT liyanageisurujith ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT gunawardanamethsala ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT dissanayakebuddini ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT udumalgalasumeda ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT rosachamith ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT samarasinghethilina ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT wijesinghepravin ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT kulatungaaruna ararecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT thanujanilushipriyangikasingankuttimudalige rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT karunarathnawgsg rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT liyanageisurujith rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT gunawardanamethsala rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT dissanayakebuddini rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT udumalgalasumeda rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT rosachamith rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT samarasinghethilina rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT wijesinghepravin rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury
AT kulatungaaruna rarecaseofselfinjectionofelementalmercury

Ejemplares similares