Orphenadrine is an anticholinergic drug used mainly in the treatment of Parkinson's disease. It has a peripheral and central effect and a known cardiotoxic effect when taken in large doses. We report the successful outcome of the treatment of a 2 1/2-year-old girl who accidentally ingested 400 mg of orphenadrine hydrochloride (Disipal). One hour after ingestion she presented neurological symptoms: confusion, ataxic walking, and periods of severe agitation. Generalized tonic-clonic seizures appeared resistant to the administration of multiple antiepileptics. They ceased after a supplementary dose of intravenous diazepam, endotracheal intubation, and mechanical ventilation. An episode of ventricular tachycardia responded well to i. v. lidocaine. Physostigmine was administered in three successive doses. The initial orphenadrine plasma level (3,55 microg/ml) was in the toxic range, associated with high mortality. The calculated elimination half-life was 10.2 h and the molecule and/or its metabolites were found up to 90 h after ingestion.

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This paper reports on an intervention whereby a critical approach to intercultural communication is implemented in a module for undergraduate students of engineering technology. The module centers on an encounter in which small teams engage with people and practices that represent cultural strangeness to them. A qualitative, exploratory study was carried out on how participating students perceive strangeness, on their motives for selecting their encounter, and on the insights as they reported and demonstrated them in their project reports. Students confirmed the primacy of first-hand experience in intercultural learning, and pointed at an open mind, a non-essentialist view of culture, and an awareness of stereotyping as key takeaways from the project. Providing additional teacher guidance could further support students in their acquisition of critical understanding, for instance through the development of validated (self-)assessment tools. The authors conclude that the described project can help to fill the observed lack of intercultural communication practices from a critical, non-essentialist perspective in engineering education. More generally, this study contributes to a wider pedagogy of encounter by elucidating the concept of strangeness as a linking concept for examining underlying dynamics in intercultural interaction.

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