BACKGROUND: Male erectile dysfunction (ED) is a common problem in the community. It may go unnoticed unless specific questions are asked. The range of management options has increased markedly over the past two decades. OBJECTIVE: This article revisits the option of intracavernosal injection therapy for male erectile dysfunction. DISCUSSION: Erectile ...

We investigated the meaning and the roots of the snake's usage as a symbol of medicine, the medical profession, toxicology and toxinology by examining mythological, archeological data and a variety of texts from the ancient Greek world. The snake figure was associated with Asclepios, the ancient Greek God of medicine, ...

The emergency management of poisoning is important in reducing the risk of mortality and morbidity in poisoned patients. This article reviews the Hong Kong system of prehospital and emergency care of poisoning, with reference to recent advances in this field. Administering activated charcoal is recommended for the gastro-intestinal decontamination of ...

A hybrid strategy that addresses both issues can be developed, and its feasability should be explored.

OVERVIEW: Severe pyrethroid insecticide poisoning is uncommon in the developed world, but more common in developing countries because of its wide use in agriculture. This short review proposes a management strategy for pyrethroid poisoning based on the present literature. It also mentions an experimental approach, which will require further study ...

Technologies for limiting emissions can be integrated into business operations, but some first require further development.

The major defence mechanism in frogs in via the secretion of toxins from their skin. In humans, intoxication may occur when part of the amphibian integument is ingested, as in the form of herbal medicines. Two groups of South African frogs have skin secretions that are potentially lethal to humans ...

OBJECTIVE: To assess the impact of the treatment guidelines on the management of paracetamol self poisoning in accident and emergency (A&E) departments. METHODS: 24 A&E departments in Wales and England provided details of their management of paracetamol poisoning before and after the distribution of national treatment guidelines to all A&E ...

Previous epidemiologic studies of poisonings in Hong Kong are regional hospital-or poison information center-based and have focused on either adults or children. This paper reports on the territory-wide hospitalization and mortality rates, comparing medicinal and non-medicinal poisonings in the general population. Between 1980 and 1995, the figures for hospitalizations and ...

The differential diagnosis of all patients with altered mental status must include drug toxicity. In particular, intentional or unintentional overdosing and/or poisoning are common emergency department presenting complaints. A comprehensive approach to managing these patients must incorporate aggressive information gathering, a careful physical examination looking for toxic syndromes, and diagnostic ...

One hundred ninety-nine household product labels were evaluated for Turkish marking and labeling requirements and the adequacy for management of high dose exposures. Fifty-six percent of the products were proper. The rest had inadequate information or did not have warning instructions, an ingredients list and/or other requirements. The requirements do ...

Pearls and pitfalls learned from our practical experiences caring for poisoned patients are presented. Clinical pearls include the following: using diagnostic tests to detect end-organ toxicity, applying physiologic principles to the management of hemodynamically unstable poisoned patients, and dealing with psychologic injuries from hazardous materials incidents. Recognizing serious complications from ...

In 1994-1996, an outbreak of horseshoe crab poisoning by eating toxic eggs of the horseshoe crab Carcinoscorpius rotundicauda affected over 100 persons in Chon Buri which located on the eastern coast of Thailand. We discuss clinical description and management of this first major outbreak. The responsible toxin has been partially ...

On March 16, 1996, paramedics and fire department personnel were requested to evaluate complaints of illness among persons exposed to exhaust fumes in an indoor ice skating facility in Seattle. Indoor-air measurements detected elevated levels of carbon monoxide (CO), prompting evacuation of the building. An investigation of the cluster of ...

Significant toxicity can result from ingestion of certain species of the Zigadenus plant, an herb occasionally confused with nontoxic wild onions. A 50-year-old man inadvertently ingested Z paniculatus and presented to the emergency department with profound gastrointestinal toxicity, hypotension, and bradycardia. The pathophysiology and management of Zigadenus poisoning are reviewed. ...

The question why Tatian, often misrepresented as an opponent of medicine per se, chose to condemn only pharmacology, has never been directly raised. His conviction that pharmakeia was a demonic lure can only be explained in the context of both popular and medical attitudes toward drugs. The basic meaning of ...

The circumstances under which poisoning by the Aconitum species or their derivatives occurred since 1950s are reviewed. Aconitine poisoning is far more common in Asia, particularly China and Hong Kong, than in the western countries. This may be because of the widespread use of herbal medicines by the Asian communities. ...

Iron overdose is the most common cause of poisoning death in children. Accidental ingestion is common because iron-containing compounds are readily available, brightly colored, often sugar coated, and frequently considered "harmless vitamins" by parents. The management of iron intoxication is controversial. This article describes the clinical presentation of iron overdose ...

Both "chuanwu", the main root of Aconitum carmichaelii, and "caowu", the dried root of Aconitum kusnezoffii or other members of the Aconitum genus, have long been used in Oriental materia medica to treat rheumatism, arthritis, bruises, fractures and cardiac complaints. These herbs contain the highly toxic diterpene alkaloids aconitine, mesaconitine ...

Although thousands of people in the world each year continue to be poisoned with botulinum toxin-food-borne, infantile, or wound botulism-the neurotoxin is now sufficiently understood to allow it to be used as a medicinal agent to paralyze specific muscles, giving temporary symptomatic relief from a variety of dystonic neurologic disorders. ...

The successful supportive management of an acute combined strychnine and aconitine poisoning is described. The clinical features including initially resistant ventricular fibrillation and biochemical findings are reported. Occurrence, signs, symptoms, mechanisms of action of both strychnine and aconitine and treatment particularly with regard to the life-threatening arrhythmia induced by aconitine ...

A 10-year (1980 to 1989 inclusively) retrospective analysis of poisoning admissions to the six major referral hospitals in Zimbabwe revealed 6018 cases. The majority of the patients were aged 0-5 years (35%) and 21-30 years (22.6%). The main agents associated with acute poisoning were traditional medicines (22.9% of the total), ...

Why has ipecac syrup become less popular in emergency management of poisoning and overdose? When should gastric lavage, activated charcoal, cathartics, or a combination of methods be used? Which patients are candidates for whole-bowel irrigation with polyethylene glycol-electrolyte solution? Drs Harris and Kingston answer these questions and present their recommendations ...

STUDY OBJECTIVE: The aim was to identify and compare rates of admission to hospital of preschool children for medicinal and non-medicinal poisoning in a defined population. DESIGN: The study was an analysis of computerised abstracts of hospital inpatient records for poisoning. SETTING: Six districts in southern England covered by the ...

The management for ingestion of oil of citronella, an essential oil, has traditionally been rigorous, including dilution with milk or oil, and gastric lavage or emesis, taking care to prevent aspiration. Recently our Centre handled five oil of citronella poisonings and their outcomes led us to review our management protocol ...

A client is described who exhibited a large number of characteristics consistent with developmental apraxia of speech (DAS). The exhibited symptoms included excessive nasal resonance and nasal emission of air due to velopharyngeal port dysfunction, for which successful management was achieved by use of a palatal lift prosthesis. The results ...

During the period 1981-1985, 1306 patients with acute poisoning were admitted to Ga-Rankuwa Hospital. Of these 60% were males and 40% females. The majority (80%) were children aged 10 years or less. Sixty patients (4.6%) died. Most poisonings were accidental and only 4.0% were due to deliberate self-poisoning. The most ...

Kochia scoparia was collected periodically during the growing seasons of 1984, 1985 and 1986. The 10, 16 and 16 samples, respectively, from these years were air dried, hammer milled and analyzed at a later date for soluble and total oxalates. An additional 6 samples from New Mexico were analyzed from ...

The history of arrow and dart poisons is briefly reviewed and this is followed by an outline of their use throughout the world. Their composition and sources of active principles, both plant and animal, are considered and certain ethnological aspects are dealt with. Finally, some applications of arrow- and dart-poison ...

Voodoo is a folk religion that emerged from the interaction of West African ethnotheologies with European Christian rituals. Haitian Voodoo priests control two major practices which might be of interest to toxicologists: healing and poisoning. Intoxications arising from therapeutic activities pertaining to this cult are of the same kind as ...

We present a case of attempted suicide by propranolol overdose presenting as convulsions followed by bradyasystolic cardiopulmonary arrest successfully managed by external transcutaneous pacing. Inotropic support and the resulting clinical improvement permitted discontinuation of cardiac pacing after 75 minutes. Pharmacologic management included glucagon late in the patient's management when the ...

Carbon monoxide causes one third of all poisoning deaths in Britain. In this paper a modern scheme for the assessment and management of victims of carbon monoxide poisoning is outlined, the importance of the direct cellular toxicity of carbon monoxide and the rationale behind hyperbaric oxygen therapy are discussed, and ...

The mechanism of toxicity and agents of anticoagulant rodenticides are discussed. The diagnosis of anticoagulant poisoning is outlined and discussed by applying clinical, laboratory, and therapeutic response measures as a means to confirm poisoning. Additional therapeutic concerns and newly developed diagnostic tests are discussed. Application of the therapeutic and diagnostic ...

Strychnine poisoning was diagnosed in free-flying mallards (Anas platyrhynchos) and a ring-billed gull (Larus delawarensis) found dead on a pond in a zoo. The probable source of toxin was improperly applied strychnine-treated grain used for control of rodents on adjacent farm land. Ingesta of the birds contained 19.7-85.1 mg/kg of ...

Nicotine is a toxic substance which is readily available from a wide variety of sources. Due to the universal availability of nicotine, the primary care physician may encounter accidental or deliberate poisoning in a variety of clinical settings and should be familiar with diagnosis and management of nicotine toxicity. We ...

Deliberate non-fatal self-poisoning due to medicinal agents more than doubled in England and Wales during the period 1968-78. Interregional analysis showed a significant positive correlation between the rate at which psychotropic drugs were prescribed by general practitioners (GPs) and the medicinal self-poisoning rate. Regression analysis indicated that a reduction of ...

Palms are the most versatile group of plants used by man, providing all of the basic necessities (food, shelter, fuel and fiber) as well as many ameliorants (spices, oils, waxes, gums, poisons and medicines). The importance of palms in the pharmacopoeias of South American Indians has received little attention. This ...

A case of cyanide poisoning from laetrile ingestion is presented as an illustration of the recognition and treatment of cyanide intoxication. The pharmacology of laetrile, of cyanide, and of antidotes to cyanide intoxication are discussed as they relate to the acute management and successful treatment of this patient after this ...

Management of ingestions of small flat disc batteries has been controversial. The Nassau County Medical Center's Long Island Regional Poison Control Center has had 30 calls concerning battery ingestions in the past 16 months. In 1976, the National Clearinghouse for Poison Control Centers reported 42 battery ingestions for the entire ...

During the 12-month period May 1981-April 1982 277 Black patients with acute poisoning were admitted to Ga-Rankuwa Hospital, Pretoria. The majority of the patients (71%) were children, males predominated (55%), and only 4% were deliberate self-poisonings. Paraffin was the agent responsible in 50% of the cases, traditional medicines in 18% ...

Review of the Duke Poison Control Center records for 1977 revealed an evening peak for preschool poisonings, while older victims had a late night maximum. When the reports were stratified by poisoning agent, both age groups showed diurnal trends for internal medicines, plants, household products, and pesticides. In addition, preschool ...

Review of 2,339 Duke Poison Control Center records for calendar year 1977 revealed that preschool children had an autumn peak for all poisonings; older victims a summer predominance. When the reports were stratified by poisoning agent, significant summer predominance was noted in preschool victims for plants, pesticides, paints, and cosmetics; ...

A case of deliberate disopyramide overdosage is described. Circulatory collapse was treated by means of a large dose of isoprenaline, and charcoal haemoperfusion was used in an attempt to enhance the elimination of disopyramide. The suitability of this treatment regime is discussed in the light of findings from animal studies ...

The Department of Family Medicine at the University of Western Ontario has been training family practice residents in community based group practices for four years. The methods used to select and evaluate the residents and their practice experience are outlined in this article. Despite difficulties which arose as a result ...

Most physicians involved in the diagnosis and management of foreign body aspiration and caustic ingestion assume that the numbers of these cases are decreasing. A sizeable number of patients die of caustic ingestion and poisoning annually, and deaths from foreign body ingestion have more than doubled since 1950. Increasing the ...

Severe acute iron poisoning developed in a 1 1/2-year-old child who had eaten an iron preparation that resembles a popular chocolate candy. Tablets containing iron, with and without vitamins, and the sugar-coated candy of similar appearance, were radiographed with human gastric juice in vitro. Times of dissolution of the radiopaque ...

A review was carried out on patients with acute drug poisoning managed over a five-year period, between 1968 and 1972 at the University College Hospital, Ibadan, Nigeria. Of the 139 cases, 23 were admitted for in-patient management while the rest were managed in the Emergency Department of the hospital as ...

Three child-resistant locks were incorporated into a medicine cabinet, an under-the-sink cabinet, and a vanity box. Three hundred 3- to 5-year-old children were tested against these locks. Only two were able to open the receptacles, whereas all 50 of a group of adults and teenagers similarly tested were able to ...

Lead isotopes in North American coals are equally or much more radiogenic than those in the present continental crust (a mean composition for the continental crust is used). It is practicable to distinguish coal and gasoline lead pollutants by examining their isotopic compositions.

This article focuses on the causes, diagnosis and management of carbonr monoxide poisoning. It describes assessment strategies and treatment options for the patient with potential carbon monoxide poisoning.