A cautionary tale: beware the former boyfriend
SF Gate recently ran a frightening cautionary tale that starts with a pretty awful premise - woman dosed on salvia without her knowledge - and ends much worse than you might imagine:
An 18-year-old woman was admitted to a psychiatric hospital, after reportedly smoking marijuana, with schizophrenia-type symptoms. She was agitated, disorganized and hallucinating. Several days later, her former boyfriend revealed that she had unknowingly smoked leaves and leaf extracts of Salvia divinorum added to her marijuana joint. The young woman had a long history of cannabis use with no untoward effects, but had never before used salvia. After increasing self-mutilating behavior in the hospital, she was involuntarily admitted to a closed ward. Despite large doses of intravenously and intramuscularly administered anti-psychotic drugs, she remained highly psychotic, with disordered thinking, delusions, and slow speech. A few nights later, she was transferred to an intensive care unit because of "a marked decrease of alertness." She had developed a toxic psychosis with stupor and catatonic excitement. Because the anti-psychotic medications (Zyprexa and Haldol) were having no useful effect, the young woman was given two series of electroconvulsive treatments, but these were discontinued because she had recurrent episodes in which her heart stopped for periods as long as 5 seconds. Her erratic heartbeat required a temporary external cardiac pacemaker.
In a masterpiece of understatement, the article continues with (italics added by me for emphasis):
Then things started to turn bad .... Her agitation caused her to bite off a 1/2-inch-by- 1/2-inch part of her tongue, which she aspirated, requiring tracheal intubation and ventilation. She developed elevated temperature, a drop in blood pressure and a rigid abdomen. An X-ray showed signs of peritonitis. An exploration of her abdomen disclosed several necrotic (dead, dying) areas of her small intestine and colon, requiring surgical removal of the affected parts.
Erowid contributing editor Lux pointed out, "One thing that is not made particularly clear in this article is that the described necrosis of the small intestine and colon resulted not from the Salvia, but rather from the regimen of antipsychotic meds the poor woman was administered." I suspect the author of the article, Dr. Eugene Schoenfeld, who "practices psychiatry and addiction medicine in Sausalito," overlooked making this point overtly because it seemed obvious to him; I'm giving him credit since his bio indicates, "During the 1960s and 1970s, he provided information about psychoactive drugs through his Dr. Hip Pocrates newspaper columns and radio programs."
The main conclusion to draw, of course, is not that salvia is inherently negative, although it's possible that mainstream media might draw that conclusion. No, the main conclusion is that this woman's former boyfriend, if he indeed turns out to be responsible for dosing her, deserves to be run through a threshing machine.
Fortunately (speaking relatively, of course):
After a long hospitalization, which included decreasing doses of anti-psychotic drugs, her psychotic symptoms resolved and she was discharged in a psychiatrically stable condition.
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Anyway, I'm glad she was eventually back to "normal". Shame on the boyfriend if he really did dose her without her knowledge.
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