Auto-aggressive metallic mercury injection around the knee joint: a case report

BMC Surgery

Case Report

Andreas Leithner¹  Werner Maurer-Ertl¹  Joerg Friesenbichler¹  Elisabeth Wolf¹  Patrick Sadoghi¹ 

[1] Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Medical University of Graz, Auenbruggerplatz 5, 8036, Graz, Austria;

关键词: Mercury;    Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis;    Foreign Body;    Chelate Therapy;    Elemental Mercury;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2482-11-31

 received in 2011-04-15, accepted in 2011-11-17,  发布年份 2011

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundAccidental or intentional subcutaneous and/or intramuscular injection of metallic mercury is an uncommon form of poisoning. Although it does not carry the same risk as mercury vapour inhalation, it may cause destructive early and late reactions.Case PresentationHerein we present the case of a 29-year-old male patient who developed an obsessive-compulsive disorder causing auto-aggressive behaviour with injection of elemental mercury and several other foreign bodies into the soft tissues around the left knee about 15 years before initial presentation. For clinical examination X-rays and a CT-scan of the affected area were performed. Furthermore, blood was taken to determine the mercury concentration in the blood, which showed a concentration 17-fold higher than recommended. As a consequence, the mercury depots and several foreign bodies were resected marginally.ConclusionBlood levels of mercury will decrease rapidly following surgery, especially in combination with chelating therapy. In case of subcutaneous and intramuscular injection of metallic mercury we recommend marginal or wide excision of all contaminated tissue to prevent migration of mercury and chronic inflammation. Nevertheless, prolonged clinical and biochemical monitoring should be performed for several years to screen for chronic intoxication.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Friesenbichler et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2011. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.