[Acute voluntary carpipramine poisoning with ventricular tachycardia]

A case of carpipramine overdose is reported. The patient was admitted with ventricular tachycardia 4 h after taking 2.40 g of the drug. This disappeared at the sixth hour. In overdoses with other tricyclics, ventricular tachycardia was successfully treated within 30 min of starting a sodium lactate perfusion. In the case presented, reversal of the ventricular tachycardia coincided with the half-life of the drug; the effects of perfusing 1000 ml sodium lactate over 2 h seemed doubtful. This sodium resistance may be related to a relative hypokalemia (3.4 mmol X 1(-1) ). The use of sodium lactate for the treatment of overdoses with drugs with short-half lives appeared questionable.