Rhabdomyolysis as a manifestation of clomipramine poisoning

CONTEXT:Tricyclic antidepressive agents are widely used in suicide attempts and present a variety of deleterious effects. Rhabdomyolysis is a rare complication of such poisoning.CASE REPORT:A 55-year-old woman ingested 120 pills of 25 mg clomipramine in a suicide attempt two days before admission. A...

ver descrição completa

Detalhes bibliográficos
Autores: Santana, Nathalie Oliveira De, Góis, Aécio Flávio Teixeira de [UNIFESP]
Formato: artículo
Estado:Versión publicada
Fecha de publicación:2013
País:Brasil
Recursos:Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP)
Repositorio:Repositório Institucional da UNIFESP
Idioma:inglés
OAI Identifier:oai:repositorio.unifesp.br:11600/7568
Acesso em linha:http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1516-3180.2013.1316541
http://repositorio.unifesp.br/handle/11600/7568
Access Level:acceso abierto
Palavra-chave:Clomipramine
Antidepressive agents, tricyclic
Rhabdomyolysis
Poisoning
Toxicology
Clomipramina
Antidepressivos triciclicos
Rabdomiolise
Envenenamento
Toxicologia
Descrição
Resumo:CONTEXT:Tricyclic antidepressive agents are widely used in suicide attempts and present a variety of deleterious effects. Rhabdomyolysis is a rare complication of such poisoning.CASE REPORT:A 55-year-old woman ingested 120 pills of 25 mg clomipramine in a suicide attempt two days before admission. After gastric lavage in another emergency department on the day of intake, 80 pills were removed. On admission to our department, she was disoriented, complaining of a dry mouth and tremors at the extremities. An electrocardiogram showed a sinus rhythm with narrow QRS complexes. Laboratory results showed high creatine phosphokinase (CK = 15,094 U/l on admission; normal range = 26 to 140 U/l), hypocalcemia, slightly increased serum transaminases and mild metabolic acidosis. The patient's medical history included depression with previous suicide attempts, obsessive-compulsive disorder, hypothyroidism and osteoporosis. She presented cardiac arrest with pulseless electric activity for seven minutes and afterwards, without sedation, showed continuous side-to-side eye movement. She developed refractory hypotension, with need for vasopressors. Ceftriaxone and clindamycin administration was started because of a hypothesis of bronchoaspiration. The patient remained unresponsive even without sedation, with continuous side-to-side eye movement and a decerebrate posture. She died two months later. Rhabdomyolysis is a very rare complication of poisoning due to tricyclic drugs. It had only previously been described after an overdose of cyclobenzaprine, which has a toxicity profile similar to tricyclic drugs.CONCLUSIONS:Although arrhythmia is the most important complication, rhabdomyolysis should be investigated in cases of clomipramine poisoning.