Clinical Practice and Cases in Emergency Medicine

Introduction: Severe hypernatremia is a critical situation, and when coupled with intravascular depletion and hypotension can create a treatment dilemma.

Case Report: We present the case of a medically complex patient who had gradually worsening alteration of mental status and mean arterial pressures in the 50s on presentation to the emergency department.

Conclusion: Final diagnoses included severe hypernatremia and hypovolemic shock secondary to poor oral intake. We used judicious fluid repletion with gradual improvement in sodium levels and permissive hypotension to avoid rapid osmotic shifts. Balancing reperfusion and the risk for osmotic effects of aggressive fluid resuscitation can be a challenging situation for the multidisciplinary team.