Be water, my friend, but don't drink it all

November 28, 2022 12:33 PM

Who killed Bruce Lee? The hyponatraemia hypothesis [link to Clinical Kidney Journal article, should be non-paywalled]

The abstract:

Bruce Lee brought attention to martial arts in the Western world and popularized the quote ‘Be water, my friend’. Lee died at the age of 32 years in Hong Kong on 20 July 1973, under mysterious circumstances. The cause of death is unknown, although numerous hypotheses have been proposed, from assassination by gangsters to the more recent suggestion in 2018 that he died from heatstroke. The necropsy showed cerebral oedema. A prior episode was diagnosed as cerebral oedema 2 months earlier. We now propose, based on an analysis of publicly available information, that the cause of death was cerebral oedema due to hyponatraemia. In other words, we propose that the kidney’s inability to excrete excess water killed Bruce Lee. In this regard, Lee had multiple risk factors for hyponatraemia that may have included high chronic fluid intake, factors that acutely increase thirst (marijuana) and factors that decrease the ability of the kidneys to excrete water by either promoting secretion of antidiuretic hormone (ADH) or interfering with water excretion mechanisms in kidney tubules: prescription drugs (diuretics, non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs, opioids, antiepileptic drugs), alcohol, chronic low solute intake, a past history of acute kidney injury and exercise.

posted by Halloween Jack (11 comments total)

I would've thought that a life of getting his kidneys beaten up would factor more in the paper? I guess they're stronger than i would have thought.
posted by bleep at 12:51 PM on November 28, 2022

I did not expect to see "family curse" as a cause of death in a serious medical document.
posted by meowzilla at 1:05 PM on November 28, 2022 [3 favorites]

He and son.Brandon are buried together in Lakeview Cemetery just north of Volunteer Park in Seattle. Those are the graves of heroes. They are almost always covered with bouquets, coins and gifts.
posted by y2karl at 2:15 PM on November 28, 2022 [4 favorites]

Matthew Polly [13] hypothesized that Lee’s removal of axillary sweat glands a month prior to 10 May 1973 could increase the risk of heatstroke. However, sweat is produced through most of the skin surface…

I would never have guessed this was a thing, but I can imagine it would be helpful on the set!
posted by sjswitzer at 4:05 PM on November 28, 2022

He was an actor, not a fighter. He beat his own kidneys up through overtraining maybe, but he wasn’t getting hit in them.
posted by The Monster at the End of this Thread at 6:19 PM on November 28, 2022 [1 favorite]

Why necropsy which is a term usually associated (at least here in the US) with animals, rather than autopsy?

Sorry this just jumped out at me ...
posted by alwayson_slightlyoff at 9:34 PM on November 28, 2022

Though he was also a very skilled and experienced fighter so I don't imagine he took very many shots to the kidneys no matter how many actual fights he was in. So that's another reason overtraining is more likely.
posted by VTX at 2:59 PM on November 29, 2022

alwayson_slightlyoff- the root Greek words for autopsy come from the words for 'self' and 'seen'. This is a nod to the old belief that humans were the only 'knowing' beings on the planet. For non-'knowing' beings like animals, the root 'necro' meaning death is used, roughly translating to 'seeing the death'.

So all autopsies are necropsies (the examination of a human death) but not all necropsies are autopsies, because in that old thinking animals != humans.
posted by eriphyle at 4:01 PM on November 29, 2022 [1 favorite]

Thank you, eriphyle, for that explanation.
I hold a degree in Public Health, and the distinction was always made: autopsy for humans, necropsy for animals.

The wording in that abstract, and indeed now having read the Journal article, struck me as odd but it is consistent throughout. Style perhaps.
posted by alwayson_slightlyoff at 6:19 PM on November 29, 2022

Matthew Polly [13] hypothesized that Lee’s removal of axillary sweat glands a month prior to 10 May 1973 could increase the risk of heatstroke. However, sweat is produced through most of the skin surface…

I would never have guessed this was a thing, but I can imagine it would be helpful on the set!

I similarly didn't know that was just a thing someone could (or, frankly, would) do. That does sound pretty consequential in this situation.

Is that still a thing that's being done, or is that like "well, they've got a cough, better pull out those tonsils" (or, for another example, an appendix for other specious reasons) that we've since realized is a bad idea?

I've just genuinely never heard of removal of sweat glands, axillary or otherwise.
posted by revmitcz at 2:36 AM on November 30, 2022

I think that I've heard of it in cases where people sweat a lot, and I mean a lot more than the average.
posted by Halloween Jack at 12:28 PM on November 30, 2022