title: Etiological and demographical characteristics of acute adult poisoning in Ankara, Turkey.
abstract: 1. The aim of this retrospective study was to evaluate etiological and demographical characteristics of acute adult poisoning patients during 1 year at a university hospital in Ankara, Turkey. 2. Two-hundred and twenty-eight adults (of which 180 were suicidal poisoning cases) were admitted to the emergency center with acute poisonings. This was 0.7% of all emergency admissions. The female-to-male ratio was 3:1, and the majority of patients (63.6%) were below the age of 25 years. 3. Drugs were the major cause in 75. 9% of the cases, followed by inhalation of gases (17.6%), food (2. 6%), corrosives (2.2%), pesticides (0.9%), and alcohol (0.9%). Analgesics were the most common cause of drug poisoning (29.7% of all substances). There were no fatalities. 4. It is important to realize that this study is a hospital-based study, and hence it may be considered difficult to draw conclusions for the whole population of Turkey. However, we consider that the reason for such a high ratio of analgesic poisoning is probably due to the habit of extensive analgesic prescribing in Ankara, which is the capital of Turkey.
authors.affiliation: Department of Anesthesiology and Reanimation, Gazi University School of Medicine, Ankara, Turkey.
authors.forename: Z
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Ozköse
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Ayoglu
mesh_terms: D000208:Acute Disease; D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000700:Analgesics / Q000506:poisoning; D000928:Antidepressive Agents / Q000506:poisoning; D003710:Demography; D005260:Female; D006760:Hospitalization; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care; D011041:Poisoning / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000209:etiology* / Q000628:therapy; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D013405:Suicide; D014421:Turkey / Q000453:epidemiology
chemical_list: D000700:Analgesics; D000928:Antidepressive Agents