question for doctors an unnecessary death
 

One of my daughter's friends, aged 25, just died this week after the oxygen being fed to her at the hospital ignited and burned her.
How does this happen?

Organic material in the regulator or tubing?

Condolences to your daughter for her loss and her friends family.


I don't think O2 (even pure) burns - it just helps everything else burn really well.

Oil vapors in the regulator, etc. but something caused it to ignite...

Well, oxygen is certainly an increased risk for fire. We rarely see this with people who are smokers and have lung damage. We ask them if they are still smoking and strongly advise them to stop if they start oxygen, but some people just can't quit.

There might have been a source of ignition in the room, perhaps a spark or something similar. The only times I have heard of oxygen related fires in the hospital has been when someone was smoking in the room or during surgery when using cautery or other sources of ignition. It is possible that a small spark could have caused the problem. Tough to say.

My condolences.

What a devastating tragedy!

I have never heard of anything like that happening here in Sweden.

There is an autopsy to be performed, maybe we'll learn something and I'll pass it along.

Not enough info.

tried to google for a news story but could not find anything. any details to help in the search. this is something new to me.

Don't know why, but consider this, air is 20.9% oxygen the rest is Nitrogen, argon, water, etc. Pure oxygen is almost 5x as much oxygen to support combustion. Static electricity could cause a spark and you'd give an oxygen rich environment to support a hot, fast fire. Very sorry to hear about this.

That's been my experience. I had a patient when I lived in New York who survived two O2 fires. He was using very high-flow O2 and he was smoking both times. He was burned, but not fatally.

Very sorry to hear about this. Can you offer any details about her condition that led to hospitalization?

Hugh is correct. The thing I can't figure out is what was the fuel for the fire.

She had a rough life, been in foster homes, and was in hospital undergoing a biopsy to determine what cancer she had. Then she had trouble breathing and was given O2 and burned and then was airlifted to UC Davis, I believe. The events at hospital were relayed third hand. She is in a better place now.

Unfortunately, two years ago my son lost a friend at local hospital when he was injected with wrong medicine and died the same day. They discovered the problem soon after injecting him and there was nothing to be done, they told the boy and parents. Very sad.

Awful stories. Just terrible.

Re: question for doctors an unnecessary death
 

Jesus, that's horrible. If you knew her at all, my deepest condolences. That's just unbelievable and horrible beyond words!

In a pure ox environment even a blanket burns much faster and much hotter. So basically, in 100% ox, everything flammable is legitimate fuel.

My buddies apartment just burned down last week from a guy smoking on oxygen. But the oxygen tanks didn't explode?????? Weird.

Sorry for your daughters loss and the young ladies family, that's terrible.

High-pressure cylinders have a blow-out disk that ruptures when they are over pressurized.

Dan,

Why do you make a statement like that on a serious thread? I have so many clever responses that would be inappropriate under the circumstances.

I fail to see what is inappropriate about what he wrote.