Talk:Electrolyte imbalance

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This talk page was moved from Water-electrolyte imbalance

Peer Review

Hello, this is an excellent job! Given your work plan, I have the following comments:

-Overall, I think you did a great job with structure -Language seems neutral, no opinions identified -Sometimes the choice between using jargon and lay terms is not consistent (e.g., "heart and neurological," can change to "heart and nervous system; "patient management in medicine-->" "patient management in a hospital"; "low blood pressure, cardiac arrhythmias"; will highlight more of these later for you) -It seems you added a section on chloride and magnesium but not some of the others (lead, bicarb, phosphate); these are off to a good start -I like there being a section specific to diet -It seems you comment on the relevant organs involved for all expect sodium, worth adding a sentence there? 76jualendal (talk) 17:01, 23 March 2020 (UTC)

UCSF Wiki Course Workplan

Hello, I will be involved in editing this page as part of a wiki course. I've included my workplan and would love feedback or suggestions to make sure my work is as impactful as possible.

Overall

• Structure for clinically important electrolytes exist
• Improve readability and decrease medical jargon

Lead

• Add overview of electrolytes
• Correlate with body of article

Content

• Add more content specific to all electrolytes
  • Related disease processes
• Add more information and references to calcium homeostasis
• Evaluate lay sources for what electrolytes are most relevant to the public — Preceding unsigned comment added by Brightlybright (talk • contribs) 18:55, 6 March 2020 (UTC)
• Consider adding the following, prioritizing the most clinically relevant:
  • Bicarbonate
  • Magnesium
  • Phosphate
  • Chloride
• Consider adding information regarding how nutrition and diet is relevant to electrolyte balance
• Embed links to main articles on all electrolyte derangements

Sources

• Find and secondary review articles from Pubmed
  • Contribute data and references from non-Emergency literature
• Improve number of references and increase number of citations
• Add more images to facilitate understanding

Brightlybright (talk) 06:01, 6 March 2020 (UTC)

MUSC WikiProject Medical Writing Workplan

• It is difficult to discuss electrolyte disturbances without recognizing the differences in symptoms, patient presentations, and potential outcomes associated with each electrolyte. Therefore, I plan to prioritize adding sections to cover the most clinically significant electrolyte disturbances. I will prioritize discussing the three electrolytes mentioned in the introductory section: sodium, potassium, and calcium. Magnesium and phosphorus are also worth noting if time permits. Within each section, I plan to note the causes, significance, and clinical management of high and low levels of each electrolyte.
• I have already begun searching for references, and plan to use two well respected textbooks in the field of emergency medicine:

• I also plan to use uptodate for overview information of the topic, and pubmed to find literature reviews.
• As this is a topic that can quickly become extremely complex, I will attempt to exclude anything other than causes, significance, and clinical management of "hypo" and "hyper" states for each electrolyte. As of now, I do not plan on discussing detailed physiology of electrolyte movement, metabolism, or fluid distribution in the body. I do not plan on discussing in detail other medical conditions, medications, or toxins that can cause these disturbances.
• I plan on including links to other wiki pages when relevant to avoid elaborating on other clinical conditions, medications, or treatments. I believe this will be necessary when discussing causes of electrolyte disturbances, and clinical repercussions of untreated electrolyte disturbances.
• I plan to avoid jargon where-ever possible by proof-reading my edits, and having others who are not in the medical field proof-read my edits.
• This is my first time working on a wikipedia article so I am open to any and all feedback. Please let me know if you feel that there is anything I need to change or reconsider. Thank you.

--Acline94 (talk) 20:26, 18 November 2019 (UTC)

Sounds like a good plan! --Emilybrennan (talk) 14:07, 25 November 2019 (UTC)

I added a section on sodium imbalances. I am still working on this section and will plan to add section for hyponatremia later today. Any and all feedback appreciated. Thanks! --Acline94 (talk) 15:24, 6 December 2019 (UTC)

Hi @Acline94: see my review of your article here: Electrolyte_imbalance_Peer_Review Good job on the article! Gklap (talk) 15:13, 9 December 2019 (UTC)

References

MUSC WikiProject Peer review

General info

• Whose work are you reviewing? User:Acline94
• Link to draft you're reviewing: Electrolyte imbalance

Lead

Guiding questions:

• Has the Lead been updated to reflect the new content added by your peer? Yes
• Does the Lead include an introductory sentence that concisely and clearly describes the article's topic? Yes
• Does the Lead include a brief description of the article's major sections? Yes - it does not specifically address the types of electrolyte imbalances that make up the article but I think that is fine for the intro
• Does the Lead include information that is not present in the article? Yes - some topics mentioned in the lead such as non-sodium related imbalances are not included below in the body of the article
• Is the Lead concise or is it overly detailed? Concise

Lead evaluation

Overall the lead is well written. It gives an overarching view of the article without being too specific and bogged with details. The last 3 sentences do include specific cases (i.e. bulimia, refeeding syndrome) that might make more sense if they were moved to the body of the article or at least elaborated upon there.

Content

Guiding questions:

• Is the content added relevant to the topic? Yes
• Is the content added up-to-date? Yes
• Is there content that is missing or content that does not belong? Yes - missing content

Content evaluation

The content that is included is well written and on topic for the article. To round out the article, more content should be added on other types of electrolyte imbalances (i.e. hyponatremia, hypercalcemia, hyperkalemia, etc.). As mentioned above, it would also be useful to include some specific diseases / cases that pertain to electrolyte imbalances (i.e. bulimia, refeeding syndrome) in the body of the article.

- Information included in the 2nd paragraph under General Function header may be more appropriate to include in the lead or piecemeal as you address the different types of electrolyte imbalances.

- Would edit the following sentence to account for the different permutations of both volume status (hyper and hypovolemia) has well as electrolyte status (hyper and hyponatremia).

"However, if the electrolyte involved is sodium, the issue is not a deficiency of sodium, but rather a water excess, causing the imbalance."

Tone and Balance

Guiding questions:

• Is the content added neutral? Yes
• Are there any claims that appear heavily biased toward a particular position? No
• Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented? No
• Does the content added attempt to persuade the reader in favor of one position or away from another? No

Tone and balance evaluation

The tone and balance are appropriate. The article is primarily based on well regarded textbooks and review articles. Basic electrolyte management is not a particularly controversial topic in medicine so there are generally not major disputes on this topic.

Sources and References

Guiding questions:

• Is all new content backed up by a reliable secondary source of information? Yes
• Are the sources thorough - i.e. Do they reflect the available literature on the topic? Yes
• Are the sources current? Yes
• Check a few links. Do they work? Yes

Sources and references evaluation

The sources and references are up to date and appropriate. The main sources are review articles and textbooks.

Organization

Guiding questions:

• Is the content added well-written - i.e. Is it concise, clear, and easy to read? Yes
• Does the content added have any grammatical or spelling errors? No
• Is the content added well-organized - i.e. broken down into sections that reflect the major points of the topic? Yes

Organization evaluation

The organization is logical. The causes, symptoms, treatment sub-headers are a nice way to organize each electrolyte disorder.

Images and Media

Images and media evaluation

N/A - no images in this article

For New Articles Only

New Article Evaluation

N/A - this is not a new article

Overall impressions

Guiding questions:

• Has the content added improved the overall quality of the article - i.e. Is the article more complete? Yes
• What are the strengths of the content added? see below
• How can the content added be improved? see below

Overall evaluation

The article is well written, and the content that was added is appropriate. The section on hypernatremia is well organized. As mentioned above, the article needs to be longer. There are other electrolyte imbalances that need to be included for this article to be complete.

~~~~~

Gklap (talk) 18:50, 9 December 2019 (UTC)

Initial comment

Most of the articles linked from the table are stubs at this stage. I plan to standardise and expand all of these as time permits. -- FirstPrinciples 03:19, Oct 12, 2004 (UTC)

Definition

The style for articles is to define the term in the first sentence, and not back into it with a discussion. --NameThatWorks 15:44, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Alarmist statement about renal failure

Here we have lots of scientific info and no references. I take particular issue with the following proclamation.

The most common cause of electrolyte disturbances is renal failure.

This appears to contradict the information in the next paragraph:

Chronic laxative abuse or severe diarrhea or vomiting can lead to electrolyte disturbances along with dehydration. People suffering from bulimia or anorexia are at especially high risk for an electrolyte imbalance.

I bet these conditions are more common than renal failure. Therefore I feel that the first statement is alarmist. Anyway, since when was Wikipedia in the business of offering diagnoses? I intend to investigate and possibly remove this statement since it seems false. Neoprote (talk) 18:16, 16 May 2008 (UTC)

I believe you may be incorrect, this statement is correct, as the primary causes of sodium imbalances are caused by rapid excretion of sodium from the body and also rapid alterations to the individuals fluid balance. Therefore this statement is not alarmist — Preceding unsigned comment added by AJH0014 (talk • contribs) 23:12, 1 June 2011 (UTC)

Maybe not alarmist, but definitely inaccurate. You mention sodium imbalance. Much more common are potassium and magnesium imbalance, the causes of which include metabolic disorders, cancer, dehydration, nutrient malabsorption, use or abuse of diuretics, alcohol, steroids, amphetamines etc. Also marathon runners sweat out electrolytes and sometimes over drink water. Even stress can cause a drop in potassium and magnesium. A lot of otherwise healthy people admitted to hospital with cardiac arrhythmias are found to have electrolyte problems not resulting from renal failure. Starvation is also a cause, including in cases of eating disorders. Renal failure is quite UNcommon, wheras the cases I mentioned above present regularly in emergency rooms. Medication happens to be the most common cause, and I CAN find citations for that. If no citation is forthcoming for the above statement, which I am almost certain is incorrect, I will be editing this with reliable sources. 21stcenturypolitix (talk) 11:32, 26 April 2014 (UTC)

Hypercalcaemia?

This article lists calcium as one of the electrolytes that can be imbalanced. I think it would make sense to add a link to the article on hypercalcaemia to the See Also section. Hypercalcaemia, is the overabundance of calcium in the body.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hypercalcaemia — Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.115.13.130 (talk) 12:09, 22 August 2016 (UTC)

Caused by Lab Error?

The most common cause of hyperkalemia is lab error due to potassium released as blood cells from the sample break down. -- this sounds like it's describing a case where a test says the patient has hyperkalemia, but it's a false positive because the lab screwed up and the sample broke down before or partway through the test. Hence, the patient doesn't actually have hyperkalemia. If this meaning is correct, it shouldn't be described as "the most common cause of hyperkalemia," but as "the most common cause of a positive test for hyperkalemia," and even that I'd adjust to explain what's really going on, like: False positives are common while testing for hyperkalemia; they can occur when potassium is released as blood cells from the sample break down. This type of lab error accounts for the most common cause of a positive test for hyperkalemia or something (my phrasing is awkward and I'm not sure of the science/details).

If, however, the lab error is something that induces hyperkalemia in the patient (e.g. prescribing the wrong drugs), the above sentence is not describing this well, and should be adjusted to describe what is really going on. Kilyle (talk) 07:11, 11 February 2021 (UTC)