Is it a concern that my mother had a sudden 1-minute episode of unconsciousness with varying blood pressure?

Question

Hello doctor,

My mother felt dizzy and sweaty, eventually fainted for about a minute. She was not responding to anything and after that woke up to the sound of calling her. Her blood pressure reading shorty after was 99/55. She ate some stuff very little here and there and it went up to 107/64. I am very concerned and I want to know if this needs investigation. Is this a serious issue? She has been working really hard for the past few days. At the day of fainting, she only ate a couple of biscuits. Her sugar level at the time after she fainted was around 170 with the quick home test. And she takes Glucophage, cholesterol tablets, and blood pressure medication on a daily basis.

Answer 1

Hello,

Welcome to icliniq.com.

I can understand your concern. According to your statement, your mother has a history of dizziness, sweating, and fainting for a minute. The clinical features from which your mother was suffering may result from various underlying health conditions like low blood sugar levels or hypoglycemia, low blood pressure or hypotension, dehydration, heat exhaustion, transient ischemic attack or TIA, strenuous workload, cardiac problems, obesity medications, etc. Treatment depends on the causes. Some investigations like CBC (complete blood count), serum electrolytes, electrocardiography (ECG), and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) of the brain may help to detect the exact causes of your mother's sufferings and then treat them accordingly.

As your mother had a history of strenuous workload, intake of insufficient foods and fluids, low blood sugar, and low blood pressure, she may be with electrolytes imbalance. So, I do not think that she needs to undergo further investigations for her single episode. However, if such type of episode or incident occurs again, she should undergo further investigations for proper diagnosis and treatment.