*sigh* My google-fu is failing me...

[agilebrit]

Does anyone know how much cerebrospinal fluid you can lose before you die from it? Either my search terms are inadequate, or, more likely (me being me), I can't find it because dwelling on stuff like this for any extended length of time makes me woozy and faint, so I have to keep cutting away from the page before I can find what I'm looking for.

Yes, I realize the irony of that, considering what I write. This is me, headdesking mightily.

But at least I've done words today. Lots of them, in fact... Well. Lots for me. I have a light at the end of my tunnel if I can just find out this one piece of info I need for my plot.

Comments

[lady-moriel.livejournal.com]

Ask around on little_details? Someone there is sure to know, if it hasn't already been posted (which...considering how esoteric the question is, I have no idea, but). Failing that I could try some google-fu-by-proxy for you later since my squick level tends to be...eh, different, I suppose.

[agilebrit.livejournal.com]

Well, now I'm skating around it. I dearly love my Writing Buddy. He helps me so much.

And I'm also playing with a THIRD ending for the thing. *headdesks*

[magista.livejournal.com]

The website spinalheadache.org has some information about spontaneous CSF leaks and the resulting symptoms. You might be able to ask in the message forum about how much loss leads to death.

The Wikipedia article suggests that you can live (if quite uncomfortably) for a while with intracranial hypotension.

Google search terms "csf leak" and "intracranial hypotension" return the most relevent hits, but I still can't find mention directly of deaths related to it. But there are certainly plenty of unpleasant symptoms to throw around...

[agilebrit.livejournal.com]

Basically what's happening is that my medical examiner knocks a guy out and steals his spinal fluid. But if there's a certain level the guy can lose without dying, then he might take it gradually rather than all at once, if it means he doesn't have to wait too long.

But my ME is desperate and might not care. ARGH. Maybe I'll just do that.

[dmdomini.livejournal.com]

Googling around, headaches caused by low CSF are saying "less than 60mm H20", but my medical knowledge isn't good enough to know if that's true, or something totally different taken out of context and only tangentially related. (IE, you'd want to do more research before grabbing that number and using it.)

Headaches, blurry vision, dizziness seem to be hallmarks of low CSF. Reading the wikipedia, it seems this fluid cushions the brain so that it effectively weight less than it should according to mass so that its own weight doesn't crush the lower parts of itself and prevent them from getting good blood flow. It also cushions the brain against knocks against the cranium in day to day life. So the low fluid levels would manifest as bad headaches, and probably stroke-like symptoms if it goes on long enough, unless violent movement was happening, in which case some flavor of concussion/hemmoraging would occur more easily than normal because the fluid cushion is no longer adequate.

These are interesting questions, that you ask, btw.

[agilebrit.livejournal.com]

I just needed to know how much my one character could safely harvest from the other character without killing him. But it doesn't matter now, because I'm plotting around it. *evil laughter*