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Heavy Metal Poisoning
Published in Charles Theisler, Adjuvant Medical Care, 2023
The heavy metals most commonly associated with poisoning of humans are lead, mercury, arsenic, and cadmium. Heavy metal poisoning may occur as a result of industrial exposure, air or water pollution, foods, medicines, improperly coated food containers, or the ingestion of lead-based paints.
Heavy Metals
Published in Dongyou Liu, Handbook of Foodborne Diseases, 2018
Although most heavy metals have limited or no biological functions in living organisms, some (e.g., lead, mercury, arsenic, cadmium, and chromium) are able to mimic, compete, or deplete nutritionally essential trace elements that form parts of cellular components or metabolites, thereby disrupting the biological functions of relevant tissues or organs and causing a diversity of clinical disease (commonly known as heavy metal poisoning). Another mechanism of heavy metal toxicity is through generation of ROS that deplete cellular antioxidants, leading to oxidative stress and eventual apoptosis. Since heavy metals are ubiquitously distributed in the environment, improved education about their toxicity and approaches to avoid their taking-up are crucial to reducing the incidence of heavy metal poisoning in the human population. Further research on the molecular mechanisms of heavy metal poisoning is also necessary to develop more effective measures against this important disease.
Psychiatric Misdiagnosis
Published in Mark S. Gold, R. Bruce Lydiard, John S. Carman, Advances in Psychopharmacology: Predicting and Improving Treatment Response, 2018
Heavy metal poisoning can occur with environmental exposure, pica, or poisoning, with a wide variety of metals including: magnesium, copper, zinc, manganese, lead, mercury, thalium, bismuth, aluminum, arsenic, and bromides.4,15,50–52 Most consistently they produce an organic brain syndrome. Occasionally heavy metal poisoning can mimic major depression and somewhat less frequently acute psychosis.4,15,50–52 In children, lead poisoning, however, can be indistinguishable from attention deficit disorder with hyperactivity53 (Figure 7).
Spontaneous migration of retained intracranial bullet
Published in British Journal of Neurosurgery, 2021
Bryan D. Choi, Christopher J. Stapleton, Christine K. Lee, Ziv Williams
Given advances in neurosurgery, survival after gunshot wound to the head has become less unusual. Retained bullets can unpredictably migrate within the brain.1 In the current case, the bullet migrated over large distances, from the intracranial cavity to the skin surface, through the cranial defect. This was not associated with new neurological deficit. Factors associated with roving intracerebral bullets may include softening of surrounding tissues as well as the relative density of the bullet compared to the cerebrum.2 Underlying mechanisms for this phenomenon also involve vectors of gravitation on the bullet in typical supine or standing positions. Once the foreign body has exited the brain, local immune reactions or the force generated in wound contracture may also be implicated. In modern bullets an alloy of lead and tin is typically used, and indeed cases of heavy metal poisoning have been reported from retained fragments in systemic tissues. Ultimately, serial imaging should be considered for patients with retained intracerebral bullet fragments, along with close clinical evaluation, for early detection of potential complications associated with their dynamic course or trajectory.3
Aging erythrocyte membranes as biomimetic nanometer carriers of liver-targeting chromium poisoning treatment
Published in Drug Delivery, 2021
Qing Yao, Guobao Yang, Hao Wang, Jingzhou Liu, Jinpeng Zheng, Bai Lv, Meiyan Yang, Yang Yang, Chunsheng Gao, Yongxue Guo
Heavy metal poisoning, such as chromium poisoning, is an occupational disease that often occurs in industrial, agricultural, and mining activities. In recent years, chromium pollution in the environment and the threat to human and wildlife health have attracted great attention. As an important site of metabolism and detoxification in the body, the liver is one of the target organs of Cr(VI) toxicity. Exposure to Cr (VI), especially long-term exposure, can cause pathological changes and liver damage including hepatomegaly in the exposed population, with potential mutagenic and carcinogenic effects. The destruction of the liver structure will inevitably affect the metabolism of the liver cells and cause liver function changes. Then, many enzymes and proteins in the liver cells will enter the blood, resulting in abnormal enzymatic activity and changes in the protein content in the blood (Amin et al., 2017; Wang and Zeng, 2019). At present, the common chromium antidotes are mainly dimercaptopropanol, dimercaptosuccinic acid, penicillamine, and EDTA, but these drugs are mainly used for systemic detoxification and have certain toxic and side effects, but these agents cannot achieve targeted detoxification of the liver (Chisolm, 1992). Therefore, liver-targeted chromium poisoning detoxification is a challenging undertaking.
Childhood accidental poisoning in western Iraq: Pattern and risk factors
Published in Alexandria Journal of Medicine, 2018
Zaid R. Al-Ani, Sahar J. Al-Hiali, Riyadh H. Al-Janabi
In Iraq, poisoning is one of the chronic public health problems and caused by different poisoning agents. The most common agents were the hydrocarbons especially kerosene, then medications, household products, organophosphates, and heavy metals. Heavy metal poisoning is one of the chronic health problems in the country. Between 1956 and 1971, three outbreaks of mercury poisoning happened, all were through un-intentional consumption of wheat imported for agriculture purposes and treated by methyl mercury compounds as a fungicide.11 The first was in 1956 in northern Iraq, the second was in 1960,11 and the third was in 1971 and was the most severe and disastrous outbreak in the world following Minamata and Niigata-Minamata mercury outbreaks in Japan in 1956 and 1965 respectively.11–13 In 2013, the Poisoning Consultation Center (PCC) which is the main toxicology center of the country that receives only referred severe cases from all the country reported that metal poisoning was the most common referred poisoning type in Baghdad (82.2%), and Cupper was the most common heavy metal poison.14