Oleander flower bite Kerala nurse’s tragedy ....

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KERALA, India, May 7: The hopes and aspirations of a 24-year-old woman and her family were shattered following a tragic incident involving the consumption of oleander (arali) flower and leaf juice in Pallippad near Haripad. read here

Temples under the Travancore Devaswom Board in Kerala on Thursday made a significant change to their offerings by discontinuing the use of Arali flowers (oleander) in their sacred rituals. Read Here
 
> involving the consumption of oleander (arali) flower and leaf juice

No idea how this happened, it's quite known by locals that this plant is toxic, people even misused it for suicide.
There are many similar plants in tropical regions.

www.news18.com

Young Kerala Woman Loses Life After Consuming Arali Flower - News18

Surya Surendran collapsed at the Nedumbassery airport and was immediately hospitalized.
www.news18.com www.news18.com

"...while talking on the phone to her family, she unintentionally plucked and consumed the Arali flower. “Immediately she realised the mistake and spit it out, but a few drops of the leaf juice went inside,” the officer stated further..."
"The postmortem doctors revealed that some poisonous content was found in her blood but no remains of the flower or the leaf were found in her stomach. A detailed postmortem report is still awaited."

> The postmortem indicated the presence of poisonous substances in her blood, although traces of the flower or leaf were not found in her stomach contents.

Strange.
 
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Stuff of nightmares. Reminder to self: Those who are bite their nails habitually are guaranteed to meet the same fate.

Condolences to her family.
 
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Emperor said:
do you mean nail biting too is poisonous or I get sentence wrongly?
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Depends on the context. Nail biting can make you very sick deepening upon what kind of stuff you have accumulated in it but it doesn't kill unless you have literal poison on it. When you pluck something, or in this situation, the flower/leaf in question, that poisonous stuff can easily get lathered over and around your nails and you'd never notice.

And if you are addicted to nail biting, you'd just instinctively proceed to biting it. In this case, she was busy on her call but nail biters need not be busy with anything. They just.. bite. Aggressively.
 
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> When you pluck something, or this situation, the flower/leaf in question, that poisonous stuff can easily get lathered over and around your nails and you'd never notice.

Nail biting was a concern years back when parasitic worms were common especially in countries like India without effective treatments, now not that much. Still not hygienic habit at all, can also be underlying symptom of ocd, etc. if acute.

This case it an outlier, unless she is extremely allergic or have some other condition, it is said that just chewing a part of leaf which she spitted out or even eating a flower may not cause death. Should wait for more reports on this case.
Children even used to eat the flower by mistake without serious harm, it's sap, leaf, etc. that contains toxin. Is also common garden plant, used in hindu rituals.
 
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Please don't fall to misinformation...all varieties are toxic. All parts of an oleander plant is toxic. They all contain cardiac glycosides that will eventually stop your heart, so don't even dare to consume it and keep your children away from it. Poisoning is very common in rural India.. often used as a suicidal agent. Sometimes children are bought dead to ER following accidental ingestion.
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.toxicon.2010.03.026
 
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Good God... nightmarish thing to have happened! Just hours before she was leaving for her dream job everything just shatters. Can't even imagine how hard it is for her family to accept this!

Can someone please explain in simpler words what exactly is a "Cardiac Stimulatory Alkaloid" is and how it affects the heart?
 
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Black_Hawk said:
Good God... nightmarish thing to have happened! Just hours before she was leaving for her dream job everything just shatters. Can't even imagine how hard it is for her family to accept this!

Can someone please explain in simpler words what exactly is a "Cardiac Stimulatory Alkaloid" is and how it affects the heart?
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In simpler words, they augment the pumping power of the heart and slow down the heart. Like digoxin, which we commonly use for heart failure. At overdoses the slowing wil be too much and eventually the heart will stop pumping.
 
Black_Hawk said:
Alkaloid
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Alkaloid means any of a class of nitrogenous organic compounds of plant origin which have pronounced physiological actions on humans. They include many drugs (morphine, quinine) and poisons (atropine, strychnine). [a]

Many alkaloids are toxic, which are used by plants to protect themselves against the aggression from other organisms, and this instinct action is an important ecological function.

Many poisons affect the heart or blood vessels or their autonomic control; these direct or indirect effects result in cardiovascular complications that contribute substantially to morbidity and mortality in poisoned patients. [c]

From [a] and , it is clear that this stuff can be poisonous. And poison is highly effective in stopping heart beats as mentioned in [c].

Sources:
 
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@thomasjude47
Oleaner toxicity is well known among local people, it's misused for suicide (as mentioned earlier in my post) or with criminal intend.
Is mentioned in article you mentioned.

However, do you think 'chewing a part leaf by mistake and spit it out (she is a nurse !) or biting on a flower by overlooking / mistake during a mobile call and spitting it out can cause death ? Even after reporting the same to a Dr. while at a hospital ?
Postmortem report says plant content was not reported in her viscera and more reports awaited.
That is where this becomes strange.
Toxicity of this common noxious garden plant is well known, it is said that even if smoke from burning plant can be toxic.
However don't you think situation looks suspicious in this case ?

Also, in case you know Malayalam:
The plant and flower she chewed from scene:
 
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TEUser2K1 said:
@thomasjude47
Oleaner toxicity is well known among local people, it's misused for suicide (as mentioned earlier in my post) or with criminal intend.
Is mentioned in article you mentioned.

However, do you think 'chewing a part leaf by mistake and spit it out (she is a nurse !) or biting on a flower by overlooking / mistake during a mobile call and spitting it out can cause death ? Even after reporting the same to a Dr. while at a hospital ?
Postmortem report says plant content was not reported in her viscera and more reports awaited.
That is where this becomes strange.
Toxicity of this common noxious garden plant is well known, however don't you think situation looks suspicious in this case ?
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Chewing a leaf can cause death. Toxicology positivity is a hit or miss in the real life situation. This will be a MLC, so police will be on it to rule out any foulplay.
 
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TEUser2K1 said:
@thomasjude47
Oleaner toxicity is well known among local people, it's misused for suicide (as mentioned earlier in my post) or with criminal intend.
Is mentioned in article you mentioned.

However, do you think 'chewing a part leaf by mistake and spit it out (she is a nurse !) or biting on a flower by overlooking / mistake during a mobile call and spitting it out can cause death ? Even after reporting the same to a Dr. while at a hospital ?
Postmortem report says plant content was not reported in her viscera and more reports awaited.
That is where this becomes strange.
Toxicity of this common noxious garden plant is well known, however don't you think situation looks suspicious in this case ?
Click to expand...

From the article link posted at the start of this thread:

Dr. Benil Kottakkal, an expert on oleander toxicity, explained that the alkaloids present in the flower, particularly in the latex within the stalk, are cardiac glycosides that directly affect the heart. While the toxicity levels may vary among oleander plants, especially newer varieties designed to yield more flowers, the exact extent remains to be scientifically quantified.


Joseph Job, Vice-Principal and Associate Professor at the Department of Botany, SB College Changanassery, affirmed that the toxicity of oleander depends on factors such as the ingested part of the plant, the individual’s age, and health condition.

Perhaps the part she chewed had enough potent juice to enter her system and cause rapid cardiac failure? She definitely had age on her side but maybe the newer varieties of plants like stated in the article have stronger poisonous toxins and even lesser amounts are enough to kill someone?
 
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Never imagined this shrub can cause such a tragedy, parents never allowed this in our home, though we never cared !
Sad to hear tragedy of her poor family...
 
Probably she was acutely allergic to this plant.
Unfortunate.

Insightful read:

Oleander and Datura Poisoning: An Update - PMC

India has a very high incidence of poisoning. While most cases are due to chemicals or drugs or envenomation by venomous creatures, a significant proportion also results from consumption or exposure to toxic plants or plant parts or products. The ...
www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
 
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TEUser2K1 said:
However, do you think 'chewing a part leaf by mistake and spit it out (she is a nurse !) or biting on a flower by overlooking / mistake during a mobile call and spitting it out can cause death ?
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I can do a lot of things during a phone call but chewing flower leaves and flowers by accident will never happen to me.

How did it happen to this woman?
 
Some people have a habit of tinkering around when on phone, I prefer to walk than sit while on phone.
People do lot of these kind of things by habit, the locality she is from is dense tropic area, it is common for people to trifle around leaves, etc. while talking.

This shrub is also very very common in local home gardens, nurseries sell it, in the video local says by mistake children chew the flower they get in temple prasadam but haven't heard of such tragedies. The toxicity also is well aware for locals.
On the way to airport she visited hospital after vomiting, they gave her a bottle of some medicine, then she reached airport (may be didn't tell Dr. about chewing Oleander at that time? Don't know). It is then her condition worsened and she was taken to hospital, reported to Dr. in ICU that she chewed the flower. Probably acutely allergic to compounds in this plant, she had very little food that day which may have an influence. Only further research will prove all this.
 
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