A 30 year-old gentleman presented to casualty with history of pain abdomen for six days, fever and decreased urine output since two days. He was in a state of septic shock and was diagnosed to have intestinal perforation. His peripheral pulses were not palpable except for the femoral and brachial vessels. Despite fluid resuscitation, he needed infusion of high doses of dopamine and noradrenaline to maintain his blood pressure. He was operated for repair of perforation. On the first postoperative day, in the intensive care unit, vasopressin infusion was added in view of persistent hypotension. Appropriate fluid resuscitation and antibiotic therapy helped to wean him off inotropes and vasopressors by the second postoperative day. On the 3rd postoperative day, however, the patient developed discolouration and blebs on the fingers of left hand, followed by the right hand and then both the lower limbs. Subsequently, over a period of 10 days, this progressed to gangrene formation in the hands despite the patient being haemodynamically stable without any inotropes or vasopressors in this period. We conclude that the septic shock is a systemic derangement affecting all organ systems including coagulation and microcirculation. Early recognition and prompt management of sepsis, optimisation of fluid status to wean off the inotropes and vasopressors at the earliest is necessary to avoid catastrophes such as symmetrical peripheral gangrene.Keywords Symmetrical peripheral gangrene . Sepsis . Vasopressors . Multiple arterial punctures . Resuscitation.
Case ReportA 30-year-old man, an agriculturist by occupation, presented to the casualty ward with abdominal pain for 6 days and fever and reduced urine output for 2 days. He was in a state of intense septic shock with absent peripheral pulsations, and the pulse oximeter could not pick up pulsations. Despite fluid resuscitation, he needed high doses of dopamine (20 μg/kg/min) and noradrenaline (0.2-0.3 μg/kg/ min) to maintain normotension. The patient was also found to have altered coagulation parameters which were corrected with fresh frozen plasma. An emergency laparotomy revealed jejunal perforation which was closed. The patient was found to have cirrhotic liver (he was a known chronic alcoholic). Blood pressure remained persistently low, requiring addition of vasopressin infusion in the postoperative period. After multiple failed attempts at cannulation of the radial arteries in both upper limbs, a femoral arterial line was secured in the intensive care unit. By the second postoperative day, all the vasopressors were weaned off. However, cyanosis of the extremities was noted. On the third postoperative day, small blebs/blisters were noticed first in the left hand and subsequently in other limbs also which progressed to gangrene formation over the next 1 week (Figs. 1, 2, 3). Doppler evaluation revealed presence of diminished pulsations in all the vessels supplying the limbs. Echocardiogram revealed absence of any septic foci. While we were waiting for a clear demarca...