Crap. He's not getting out of the hospital the next day, then. The folks on little_details were going "Well, one pint is what they take for donation, and that's not so bad, so two pints wouldn't be that much worse would it?"

Losing two pints is roughly equivalent losing a liter of blood, which is about 15% of the total blood volume of six liters. That's actually quite easily compensated provided you drink some water and don't run a marathon immediately afterwards.

The problems I talked about before don't start until you lose more than 15% of total fluid volume, and the problem gets worse as more fluid is lost.

I found the following here:

Class I hemorrhage corresponds to a less than 15% blood volume loss and generally is well tolerated. Blood donors fall into this category. Treatment is oral rehydration or judicious use of IV fluids. These patients do have a diminished intravascular volume, but generally compensate well enough to have no classic physical signs of shock.

Class II hemorrhage is a 15%-30% volume loss. These patients generally will have tachycardia, anxiety and a lowered urine output. These are the first signs of shock. In these cases, prompt control of bleeding and resuscitation with IV crystalloid solutions are essential.

Class III hemorrhage is a 30%-40% blood loss. These patients will have a decreased blood pressure, tachycardia, minimal urine output and confusion. Such patients are unable to compensate for their volume loss. Control of bleeding and rapid resuscitation are essential to prevent later multiple organ dysfunction and death. This group of patients requires blood transfusion and may require surgical intervention to stop the source of bleeding.

Class IV hemorrhage is a greater than 40% blood loss and is rapidly fatal in all patient age groups.

So I guess it depends on how much blood is "a lot of blood" when lost to a vampire. Is your vampire character able to control him- or herself well enough to take less than 15%? If so, the victim will be good as new later that day. If it's more than that, things get dicey.

So if two pints are taken, would they bother transfusing that? That may be the problem. I can work around him not getting a transfusion, reword it to, "YOu've lost about two pints of blood, no running marathons for you, OK?"

Yes, the vampire did catch himself before he got more than a few good mouthfuls (Spike in my Career Advancement story). The fact that my victim was stone drunk at the time won't help how he feels the next day, either, so he can be good and woozy.

Ah! Sorry, I misunderstood the original question. Nope, two pints wouldn't warrant a transfusion, but if the victim does get to the hospital less two pints and still stone drunk, they'll definitely be given a liter of regular old normal saline IV; drinking dehydrates a person, and losing blood on top of that will make the person feel like reheated ass. They'll definitely be woozy and tired the next day.

Perfection. Thank you so much!

I want to go home and write! Or stay here at work and write, because the workplace makes my mind more focused on, well, working. My muse has set up a projector in my head and the next scenes are playing on the backs of my eyeballs. I keep getting distracted by character voices pitching witty dialogue at each other. But I need to work--and work with more focus than I currently am.

Dehydrated and drunk is no way to go through life, FlounderXander.

I wonder what it says about me that I bookmarked Jen's post just in case I should ever need that information.

It means your tagline is apt!

(For posterity, the tagline is "refreshingly morbid.")

Hee!

I wonder what it says about me that I bookmarked Jen's post just in case I should ever need that information.

You mean there are people who didn't?