A Dangerous New Dish

Bibimbop Brugmansia ** Do NOT try this at home.Edible flowers can make for a beautiful garnish on salads and trendy Brooklyn cocktails, but these decorative flourishes can be a disaster for the oblivious amateur. An unusual case report in BMC Research Notes summarizes what happens when you sprinkle toxic flower petals on your bibimbop (Kim et al., 2014).A 64 year old Korean woman came to the emergency room with incoherent speech and fluctuations in attention, orientation and comprehension. She had called her daughter for help but couldn't remember why. (Hint: that's because she ingested flowers containing scopolamine and atropine, two potent anticholinergic compounds that can cause amnesia).In contrast to these alterations in her mental state, she did not show dilated pupils, dry mouth, increased heart rate, or other changes to the autonomic nervous system typically observed with anticholinergics [which seems odd to me]. After 10 hours had elapsed, she became fully conscious and remembered that she had added a few flowers to her bowl of bibimbop, a traditional Korean dish. Twenty-four hours later, her memory for the entire episode was hazy.Angel's Trumpet (Brugmansia), a popular ornamental shrub, has a long history in ethnobotany and toxicology as a deliriant, differentiated from the psychedelic and dissociative hallucinogens. There are numerous case reports of presumed Angel's Trumpet poisoning in the literature. A 2003 review reported on 33 patients, 31 of whom deliberately...
Source: The Neurocritic - Category: Psychiatrists and Psychologists Authors: Source Type: blogs