Scheme for Investigating Cases of Death due to Poisoning
Paul T. Jayaprakash in Crime Scene Investigation and Reconstruction, 2023
Major indications in the scene supporting accidental poisoning are evidence of lack of deliberation and willfulness on the part of the victim in exposure to the poison. Examples include carbon-monoxide-related fatalities involving family members sleeping in closed rooms that are connected to defective heating systems or fatalities of individuals relaxing inside cars parked in closed garages with engine and air conditioner turned on. Toxic-gas-related accidental poisoning occurs when individuals get into sewage tanks or into unused wells for cleaning them. In such instances, the SOCOs can tie a live chicken in a rope by its legs and let it go into the depth of the tank or well to verify if it becomes unconscious due to the noxious gases. Accidental poisoning may also be reported during drug and alcohol abuse. Mixing of methyl alcohol with other intoxicating liquors has been the cause for mass fatalities in some parts of India. This author examined a case wherein three friends consuming alcoholic drinks mistakenly mixed cyanide considering it to be chloral hydrate, and all of them died of cyanide poisoning.
Introduction to Toxicologic Biomarkers
Anthony P. DeCaprio in Toxicologic Biomarkers, 2006
While clinical disease biomarkers have a long history, systematic efforts to discover and validate markers of adverse exposure to or effects of exogenous chemical agents (i.e., “toxicologic biomarkers”) are generally more recent. This concept has its roots primarily in two distinct professional areas; occupational health and forensic toxicology. For example, early efforts to set maximum safe levels of exposure to chemical or physical stressors in the workplace, mostly pioneered by professional organizations and individual private sector manufacturers, led to the development of occupational exposure limits (OELs) and biological exposure indices (BEIs) (2). BEIs, which are direct measurements of xenobiotics or their metabolites in blood or urine, are considered as exposure biomarkers that reflect compliance with OELs. In the forensic arena, descriptive observation of clinical signs of deliberate or accidental poisoning had been performed for centuries. However, major progress in this area was also dependent on advances in clinical laboratory chemistry during the early 20th century.
Psychiatry and social medicine
Jagdish M. Gupta, John Beveridge in MCQs in Paediatrics, 2020
13.6. Which of the following statements is/are true of tricyclic antidepressants?They are one of the major causes of fatal accidental poisoning in children.They usually provide only temporary relief of nocturnal enuresis.They are the treatment of choice for depression.They are more cardiotoxic in children than in adults.They exacerbate hyperkinetic syndrome.
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
Accidental poisoning is a continuously increasing global problem that contributes to the morbidities and mortalities even in the most developed countries as the United States.15 In Iraq, poisoning is a chronic clinical and public health problem because of its frequency, variability, severity, and the still frequent use of the toxic traditional medications to treat diarrhea and other conditions especially in rural areas. In Al-Ramadi MCTH, the difficulty in diagnosing the unknown drugs, chemicals, Sagwa and other herbal poisonings was creating a problem in the management of these cases. This was due to the absence of the serum level testing or immunoassay screening techniques in the hospital. Accordingly, some poisoning agents could not be identified and the proper antidote could not be used and the symptomatic supportive treatment would be the only available treatment method in these cases in spite of the presence of a poisoning center in the hospital. As a poisoning control program, the Iraqi Ministry of Health established a poisoning center in most of the tertiary hospitals of the country. Every center was supplied with most of the listed antidotes, anti-snake venom, anti-scorpion venom, activated charcoal and others, and with toxicology textbooks as a reference for the management of different poisoning types. In Al-Ramadi MCTH, the unknown or the difficult poisoning cases were supposed to be referred to the PCC in Baghdad for management through a medical referral system but this was difficult because of the chronic loss of security conditions and the long transportation time to the center.
Psychiatric disorders in a population of deceased drug users
Published in Nordic Journal of Psychiatry, 2021
Line Kruckow, Christian Tjagvad, Thomas Clausen, Jytte Banner
All causes of death were divided into four groups:Somatic: all somatic causes of death including medical conditions that could be caused by long-term drug use.Accidental poisonings: all deaths due to acute (accidental) poisoning by illicit substances and all types of licit medication.Trauma and other: all homicides, fatal accidents without illicit and/or licit drugs being involved or where illicit/licit substances had a contributory role but were not the underlying cause of death, and suicides (including intentional poisonings with illicit/licit substances).Unknown.
Ten-Year Comparison of Medication Complications Rates in Public and Private Hospitals in Victoria, Australia
Published in Hospital Topics, 2021
Eihab A. Khasawneh, Cameron M. Gosling, Brett A. Williams
Little is known about the causes and the contributing factors to AP events (Bari, Khan, and Rathore 2016). Accidental poisoning could be due to system (institutional-related) and personal (individual health practitioner characteristics-related) factors (Cloete 2015). The systematic factors might include staffing levels, shift length, patient acuity, and organizational climate (Khammarnia et al. 2015). The health practitioner characteristics-related factors that can lead to AP include characteristics of individual providers such as training and fatigue levels, nature of the clinical work such as the need for attention to details and time pressures, and design of the physical environment (Henriksen et al. 2008).
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