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Acute dehydration is a medical emergency caused by fluid loss, often due to diarrheal disease or lack of water intake during exercise. Treatment involves restoring fluids and monitoring for complications, with hospitalization sometimes necessary. Blood tests and neurological evaluations may be needed to check for organ damage.
Acute dehydration is the severe and rapid onset of loss of body fluids, most commonly caused by diarrheal disease. When the body loses water, electrolyte imbalances can develop. Dehydration is treated as a medical emergency and is treated by restoring fluids to the patient’s body and monitoring the patient for signs of complications such as organ damage. Hospitalization may be required to stabilize the patient, depending on the cause of the dehydration and how severe it became before treatment.
People with diarrheal disease lose body fluids rapidly due to frequent loose stools. Acute dehydration can also be caused by lack of water intake during exercise or strenuous physical work and by certain types of illnesses. People with acute dehydration tend to become extremely thirsty. Their skin and mucous membranes may feel dry and they may develop an impaired level of consciousness, decreased urine output, dark urine, fatigue and confusion.
The immediate treatment for acute dehydration is supplemental fluids. Both oral and intravenous fluids can be used in the management of dehydration. Fluids may include salts to restore the patient’s electrolytes and avoid an electrolyte imbalance caused by flooding the body with cool fluids. In patients who continue to experience fluid loss, such as patients with diarrhea, fluid supplementation can be maintained throughout the patient’s illness to prevent recurrence of dehydration. Fluids can also be given prophylactically to prevent dehydration in at-risk patients.
Once the patient has been fluid stabilized, treatment of the underlying cause of the dehydration can begin. In some cases, just providing fluids should fix the problem; an athlete who has worked too hard in hot weather with little water, for example, just needs rest and fluids to recover. In other cases, patients may need things like antibiotics to treat gastrointestinal infections.
Blood tests can be used to check organ function, looking for damage to structures such as the liver and kidneys. Brain damage is also a possibility, and once a patient is stable, a neurological evaluation may be conducted to look for signs of brain injury. These complications of dehydration may be treatable in some cases and may be permanent in others, requiring adjustments and adjustments for the patient. The longer a patient has been allowed to remain dehydrated and the more severe the fluid deprivation, the more likely the possibility of permanent physical harm from acute dehydration, especially when associated with conditions such as heat stroke.
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