It was my college vacation in January when I was
spending boring days at hostel as most of my friends were out and far away in their
villages. Just then Pintu asked me to visit nearby jungle and I said “Ok” at
once.
Pintu was a guy with tremendous energy, always doing
experiment with anything he finds. He had ambition to do all sorts of work as
far as possible on earth; from job of farmer to an astronaut. But it was his
behavior that was going to put him in a life-threatening danger today.
As per his childhood habits, he was plucking every
leaves and flowers of plants he could reach on way. He used to always injure
plants unnecessarily but unintentionally. When anyone used to remind him, he
used to reply “Sorry” with a freaky smile. And so on, we were going deeper into
jungle chatting on several topics.
Just then, we crossed a plant and Pintu was
fascinated by its fruit that was shining orange color, round and seemed ripe.
He plucked it as per his habit and broke into pieces. There were some botton-shaped seeds inside.
The experiment master tried to discover its taste and kept it in his mouth. On
crushing, he exclaimed – “Ah, So sweet! Why don’t you have one?” I kept a piece in mouth but threw it at once
when I crushed it. It was very bitter. But Pintu continued chewing saying “Wow,
So sweet!” and I knew he was lying. We moved deeper.
But after 15-20 minutes I started to feel
uncomfortable and more was Pintu. There was cocking sensation in throat which
gave feeling of suffocation. So we decided to return back.
Upon reaching hostel, we just had some rest when
Pintu’s body started to shake which went on increasing and increasing. He was
having convulsions. He complained of severe pain over his umbilicus and
difficulty in breathing. His appearance turned scary type. His face become cyanosed,
eyes were open and starring. His eyes
looked bulged and then the strangest thing happened. His body began to bend
backward and became like an arch with head and heels being ends of the arch.
And even scarier, he looked as if he were smiling. It looked like some ghosts
have attacked him. I knew it was an emergency condition and took him hospital
immediately with the help of other friends.
The doctor suspected tetanus regarding to repeated
convulsions. He injected diazepam intravenous to calm down convulsions. But it
used to rise on slight voice or even light. So he was taken to a quiet and dark
room. I followed him up to there. When convulsion was not retarded to desired
extent, he was given general anesthesia and was connected to a ventilator. He seemed
better with anesthesia.
The doctor asked me about his recent history and
activities. When I told him about button like seed, he confirmed of Strychnine
poisoning. He told it was a spinal poison with super toxicity. The plant was a
Kuchila whose seed is very fatal with poisonous chemicals like Strychnine,
Brucine, Logaine. I was also made to vomit.
After 2-3 hours, Pintu opened his eyes. Then his stomach wash was done
with a tube inserting from his mouth up to stomach. Some drugs were
administered for acidification of urine do that the absorbed poison could be
excreted out through urine. Pintu was kept under observation for few days and
was discharged.
I wanted to know more about the plant. So I went through
several books and Google. It was a Kuchila plant with Latin name Strychnos
nuxvomica belonging to family Loganiaceae. It is a tree upto 40-50 feet in
height. The seed is the most poisonous part which is disc shaped with central depression
measuring an inch in diameter and a bit hard. It is fatal only when consumed by
crushing or in powder form. Its fatal dose is 1-5 crushed seeds or 2gm of
powder and fatal period is 1-2 hours.
I also searched for its signs and symptoms. It
causes convulsions like tetany, however differ from it in many aspects. It
mostly affects anterior horn cells of spinal cord. It may lead to death causing
asphyxia due to spasm of respiratory muscles. The convulsions are first clonic
type and later on tonic type. There is an appearance known as Risus Sardonicus
in which the person gives “grin” due to fixing of facial muscles with lock-jaw
or trismus. The body bends forward, backward or laterally forming an arch. In
Opistholons, the body bends backward as in case of my friend. The body is
arched forward in Emprostholons condition where as bends laterally in Pleurothonos.
Moreover the reflex excitability is increased with onset of convulsions on
minor stimuli. The clinical features resemble tetanus case.
Finally, if you are wondering if my friend stopped
experiments, you are wrong. Now he shares our latest experiment proudly with
everyone and challenges them – “Could you ever do this?”……Ha….ha…..
