Purple Urine Bag Syndrome: a case report of an alarming phenomenon.

BACKGROUND

Purple urine bag syndrome is an uncommon phenomenon where the plastic urinary catheter bag and tubing turn purple. It occurs in some elderly constipated chronic urinary catheterization patients. The phenomenon is attributed to the presence of metabolites of tryptophan in the presence of urinary tract infection.This urine discoloration may lead to misdiagnosis and also cause great concern to patients and their relatives.

CASE REPORT: We present the clinical case of a 83-year-old female patient with dementia and hypothyroidism, chronically catheterized, who presented with purple-color urine initially misdiagnosed as having haematuria.