Citation

Hachimi-Idrissi S, Corne L, Maes V, Ramet J. Intensive Care Med. 1996; 22(12): 1442-1444.

Affiliation

Toxicology Department, University Hospital, Free University Brussels, Belgium.

Copyright

(Copyright © 1996, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

unavailable

PMID

8986501

Abstract

Gitaloxin is a digitalis glycoside used for the same indications as digoxin and digitoxin. The successful outcome for a 2 1/2-year-old boy who accidentally ingested 3 mg of gitaloxin (100 times the normal therapeutic dose) is reported. At admission the child presented with irregular heart rhythm. He subsequently started vomiting, even after continuous gastric feeding. Only 48 h after ingestion of gitaloxin he became somnolent and developed bradyarrhythmia. The symptoms disappeared 96 h later; the bradyarrhythmia, however, (second-degree atrioventricular block) decreased progressively only after 120 h. The initial clinical presentation of gitaloxin poisoning may be misleading and careful observation in a pediatric intensive care unit is mandatory. A cross-reaction between the fluorescence polarization immunoassay for digitoxin and the radioimmunoassay for gitaloxin was found and was used as a helpful, but rough, estimate of the severity of gitaloxin poisoning, in the absence of a specific measurement of gitaloxin.

Language: en