Student who drank soy sauce survives with no brain damage

CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va., June 9 (UPI) -- A U.S. college student who drank a bottle of soy sauce on a dare, survived without brain damage because of a new treatment, his doctors say.

Intentional massive sodium chloride ingestion is rare but often fatal, the 19-year-old's doctors say.

Two hours after ingesting the soy sauce the student arrived at the hospital in a coma and experiencing seizures, Dr. David J. Carlberg said.

The case study conducted by Calberg and his colleagues, Dr. Heather A. Borek, Dr. Scott A. Syverud and Dr. Christopher P. Holstege of the Department of Emergency Medicine, University of Virginia Medical Center in Charlottesville and published online in the Journal of Emergency Medicine, said the patient was administered about 6 quarts of water mixed with sugar via a nasal tube.

One month later, he appears to have survived neurologically intact -- no brain damage, the case study said.

"There are a variety of treatment recommendations for hypernatremia -- elevated sodium level in the blood -- ranging from dialysis to varying rates of correction," the researchers wrote in the study. "We reported a case of acute severe hypernatremia corrected with rapid free-water infusions that, to our knowledge, has not been previously reported."