A hospital based prospective study of acute childhood poisoning

Abstract

Objective To study acute poisoning in Sri Lankan children.Design A prospective hospital based study.Setting Lady

Profile of acute childhood poisoning in South India: A prospective study

“…Even with the increasing usage of liquid petroleum gas (LPG) for cooking and availability of electricity in rural areas, we found in our study kerosene to be the major cause of accidentally ingested poison. Similar to our study Lucas from Sri Lanka also concluded that rural people store kerosene in empty soft-drink bottles and keep within easy reach for the young child playing on the floor 13 . As evident from the few studies from North India, the incidence of kerosene poisoning has dropped over the years with increasing use of LPG and availability of electricity even in rural areas 3,5 .…”

“…Pesticides accounted for 21%, in that more than half of them were due to pyrethroids in the present study. Lucas also reported ingestion of mosquito coils in 6% of cases in Sri Lanka 13 . Pyrethroids, mosquito repellents are used extensively in India because of the fear of dengue which has become an important cause of childhood mortality.…”

“…As evident from the few studies from North India, the incidence of kerosene poisoning has dropped over the years with increasing use of LPG and availability of electricity even in rural areas 3,5 . Even in countries like Pakistan and Sri Lanka kerosene is the common agent of poisoning accounting for 50% and 36% of cases respectively 13,14 . However, Sharma et al observed only 4.9% of their cases were due to kerosene poisoning while majority were insecticide poisoning cases 6 .…”

“…We observed drugs as offending agents in 26% with sedatives and antidepressants being commonly implicated. However, drugs accounted for more than half the cases of poisonings in developed countries 13 . Data from national poisons information centre, AIIMS, New Delhi reveals that of the total 995 poisoning cases in children below 18 years of age, 21.7% were due to drugs 15 .…”

Acute childhood poisoning in Sri Lanka

“…In Sri Lanka, there were 2 large studies on acute childhood poisoning. One was done prospectively on 2,100 children admitted to the Lady Ridgeway Hospital (LRH) with suspected acute poisoning over a 15 year period (1985)(1986)(1987)(1988)(1989)(1990)(1991)(1992)(1993)(1994)(1995)(1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000) 3 . This study was urban based but also included transfers from all over Sri Lanka.…”