Analysis of acute adult poisoning cases among patients admitted to the emergency department in Bursa, Turkey

Abstract

Purpose: The aim of this study was to define the epidemiological features such as age, sex, toxic substance, suicide, and mortality rates of the adult poisoning cases among patients admitted to the Emergency Department (ED) of Uludag University Medical Faculty Hospital.Materials and Methods: Records of acute adult poisoning cases at the ED within a one-year period (June 1, 2002 - May 31, 2003) were evaluated retrospectively. Data were compared to those of similar studies from Turkey and around the world.Results: In total 430 (1.96%) of 21,934 patients admitted to the ED during the study period suffered acute poisoning. Of these patients 259 (60.2%) were women and 171 (39.8%) were men and the mean age of the patients was 29.9. Patients were exposed to different types of toxic substances: drugs (47.4%), pesticides (10.7%), toxic gases (10%), corrosives (6.5%), alcohol (3.5%), food (15.8%), toxic substances of animal origin (3.0%), and others (3.0%). In all, 29.8% of the patients were admitted to hospital, 22.3% were transferred to other hospitals, and 47.9% were discharged from the ED, and the overall mortality rate was 1.2%. In addition, 54.9% of the poisonings were suicide attempts and within this group the women to men ratio was 2.2 and the most common toxic substance was a drug (85.2%).Conclusion: Our results were similar to those of previous studies from this country as acute poisonings are more common in women and younger ages, most of them were suicide attempts, and the mortality rate was low. Our transfer rate was high and this may necessitate the organization of short-term observation of these patients.