10-year retrospective analysis of deadly poisoning applicants to emergency service

Introduction and Aim: Poisoning cases are an important social problem that can often cause mortality and morbidity. Although survival and healing in poisoning cases can be achieved with antidote application and symptomatic treatment, it is still important since it can lead to health problems that can lead to the death of young healthy individuals. Emergency services are clinics where treatment of poisoning patients is diagnosed and patients can result in healing or morbidity and mortality. In this study, our aim is to retrospectively examine the mortality of poisoning patients and to provide the literature with the data of diagnosis, treatment and results. Material and Methods: This study was performed as a retrospectivly in the Department of Emergency Medicine at Balcalı Hospital with the approval of Çukurova University Faculty of Medicine Ethics Committee. 59 patients who admitted to the Adult Emergency Medicine Service between 2009 - 2019 years, who are over 18 years of age, who exposed to toxic substances or drugs through oral, intravenous, inhalation or skin absorption, by accident, forced or suicidal purposes and were resulted in morbidity or mortality, were included in the study. The data of the cases included in the study were retrospectively researched through the hospital information management system and patient files and were recorded in the previously prepared study sheet. Research data was uploaded and analyzed on computer via "IBM SPSS 22 for Windows (SPSS Inc, Chicago, IL)". Results: A total of 59 patients were included in the study. The average age of all patients was 45.12 ± 15.83 years and 72.9% (n = 43) of the patients were male. 45.8% of the patients included in the study were in the form of poisoning for suicide. 86.4% of the cases had oral exposure to toxic substance or drug. 49.2% of the patients included in the study applied to the hospital in the first 6 hours after poisoning. In mortal poisonings, the mean age was found lower statistically significantly in patients who had purpose of suicide than patients who was poisoned accidentally (p = 0.006). In mortal poisonings, suicide attempts were also found in the background of patients who received medication or substance for suicide purposes compared to the group of patients who were poisoned by accident as a statistically significantly (p = 0.040). Discussion and Conclussions: In our study, it was found that poisoning for suicide was more common in young people and accident poisoning was more common in the elderly. It was observed that patients who took toxic substances or drugs for suicide had similar attempts in their CVs. Due to the fact that patients who took substances or drugs for suicide attempts were taking stronger and more toxic drugs, arrival vital signs could be unstable. For whatever reason, the majority of poisoning patients were found to be admitted to the hospital within the first 6 hours. Clearer data on mortality and factors affecting mortality can be obtained through more comprehensive and multicenter studies. Keywords: Emergency room, poisoning, mortal poisoning, retrospective, mortality, morbidity