Assessment of nature and pattern of poisoning cases admitted to a tertiary care hospital: a Four-year data

Abstract Background: Objective: To assess the nature and pattern of poisoning cases admitted to a tertiary care hospital. Methods: An ambispective observational study was conducted in the emergency wards of a tertiary care hospital over six months (July 2022 – December 2022). Patients who consumed poison of any age, gender, types and reasons for poisoning were included in the study. Data was collected prospectively from poison information documentation forms and retrospectively (January 2019- June 2022) from poison information database. A standard treatment guideline protocol was developed and used for treating the poisoning cases. The collected data were assessed categorically. Results: A total of 1460 patients were admitted with poisoning to the emergency department over the course of four years starting from 1st January 2019 to 31st December 2022. It included patients presented with intentional or accidental poisoning and with different types of routes of exposure. Analysis of the socio demographics of the poisoned victims depicted in the year 2019 (521) showed a greater proportion of poisoning cases. Among the 1460 poisoned victims, majority of the poisoned victims were males (864, 59.1%) followed by females (596, 40.8%). A total of (573, 39.2%) of the victims were of the age group of 21-30. The incident of intentional usage of a poisoning agent for inflicting self-harm was found to be high (1013, 59.6%) when compared to accidental poisoning (348, 23%). Pesticides were the most used agent for poisoning (585, 40%) owing to their easy availability in rural areas and larger portion of cases being from rural areas followed by medicines (397, 27.1%), household products (244, 16.7%). Among poisoning agents, Organophosphate class of pesticides was the major choice of poisoning followed by NSAIDs (154, 38.7%). A total of (224, 15.3%) cases were documented due to envenomation. Other agents implicated in poisoning involve agricultural products, plants derivatives and alcohol intoxication. Severity of the poisoning patients were assessed using Glasgow Comatose Scale (GCS) and Poison Severity Scales (PSS). GCS scoring of the poisoning victims reflected that majority of patients belongs to mild (689, 47.1) followed by moderate (418, 28.6). Out of the 1460 patients (482, 33), (572, 39.1), (198, 13.5), (22, 1.5) were minor, moderate, severe, and fatal respectively. Among the poisoning cases, most patients (699, 47.8%) were suffering from gastrointestinal symptoms High Technology Letters Volume 31, Issue 1, 2025 ISSN NO : 1006-6748 176 http://www.gjstx-e.cn/ followed by central nervous system symptoms (284, 19.4%). Conclusion: India being an agricultural zone is prone for poisoning with agrochemicals. Every year a significant number of poisoning cases are admitted to the hospital all over India. In this epidemiological study, we concluded that increase in number of poisoning cases is due to intentional and unintentional usage of agrochemicals. However, further reduction in morbidity and mortality can be achieved by updating the treatment protocols and providing poison information services.