Hypoxia and Medicine

Why would a patient who has undergone severe hypoxia related to methadone overdose have leukocytosis?

wbc 19.7

Public Comments

1. body trying to fight of something
2. If that WBC was done in the acute time-frame, on presentation to the hospital or during the first hours, it's likely nothing but a stress reaction. As you're probably aware, while there may be 5-10,000 WBC/microliter in the peripheral circulation, there are plenty more WBC's hanging out on the vessel walls. Stress hormones (epinephrine, cortisol, etc) tend to centralize this peripheral pool, shoving them off the curb into the street as it were. Of course, the clinical context is such that you have to worry about aspiration pneumonia, drug abusers may have odd infections (endocarditis and multiple brain abscesses are just two that come immediately to mind in "shooters"), and there are all the usual possibilities as well.