Why loop through all the results when you only want the first row? (see DBI for method descriptions)

sub getsqlvalue {
    my ($dbh,$sqlstatement)= @_;
    my ($value) = $dbh->selectrow_array($sqlstatement) or die "Could n
+ot execute MySQL statement: '$sqlstatement' " . $dbh->errstr;
    return $value;
}
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(i know, doesn't answer primary question, but goes to efficiency)