number of endogenous and exogenous causes such as pregnancy, liver disease, uremia, malnutrition, burns, plasmapheresis, and OCPs, leading to slight, clinically unimportant increase of duration of action of sux • Reduced by neostigmine and pyridostigmine increasing duration of action of sux • Atypical Plasma Cholinesterase ◦ Diagnosed by determining the dibucaine number ◦ Dibucaine is an amide local anesthetic that inhibits normal plasma activity by about 80%, atypical enzyme is inhibited about 20%; reflects the quality of plasma cholinesterase not quantity ◦ Dibucaine number 80 represents normal plasma cholinesterase function ◦ Heterozygous abnormal allele, dibucaine number 50-60, duration of action slightly prolonged (20-30 mins) ◦ Homozygous atypical allele, dibucaine number 20-30, have prolonged paralysis (2-6 hrs) after usual dose of sux