The establishment of a medical toxicology consulting service for advancing care of poisoning and overdose in Qatar

Joint Authors

Salim, Walid Awad
Elmoheen, Amr
Thomas, Stephen H
al-Essai, Jalal

Source

Qatar Medical Journal

Issue

Vol. 2020, Issue 3 (31 Dec. 2020), pp.1-8, 8 p.

Publisher

Hamad Medical Corporation

Publication Date

2020-12-31

Country of Publication

Qatar

No. of Pages

8

Main Subjects

Nursing
Medicine

Abstract EN

Objectives: The State of Qatar, in recent decades, underwent rapid, and substantial population growth.

The country's emergency medicine (EM) needs are met by government-operated facilities of the Hamad Medical Corporation (HMC), which see virtually all acute-care cases in adults and children.

In 2017, emergency departments (ED) established the Medical Toxicology Consulting Service (MTCS).

This report aims to outline the MTCS's initial 100 cases’ experience and report salient findings that can help ongoing national strategies in meeting Qatar's medical toxicology needs.

Methods: The study setting is Qatar, and the clinical base for the MTCS was the country's sole level I center, Hamad General Hospital.

The MTCS group is composed of six physicians, all with advanced training in medical toxicology.

The study group is composed of the first 100 consecutive cases of the MTCS registry.

Registry entry was triggered by in-person consultation, telephone consultation, or identification of cases by daily MTCS rounder surveillance of the ED's electronic tracking board.

Results: The MTCS institution identified a significant number of medical toxicology cases within the national hospital system.

The trends of poisoning in this study showed a median age of 30 years (range 1–81 years, IQR 22–36 years).

Fourteen patients were < 18 years old.

The median interval between exposure and ED presentation was 2 hours, with a range of 15 minutes to 24 hours (IQR 1–3 hours).

Most patients (71%, 95% CI, 51%–80%) were symptomatic because they were exposed.

The MTCS recommended therapeutic intervention in over a third of cases (36%, 95% CI, 27%–46%).

Decontamination procedures were ordered in 8% of cases (95% CI, 4%–15%) and specific therapies recommended in 13 cases (13%, 95% CI, 7%–21%).

Conclusions: The study highlighted that the availability of experts in medical toxicology, such as with a poison center or toxicology consultation service, results in significant resource conservation in the management of poisoned patients.

American Psychological Association (APA)

Elmoheen, Amr& al-Essai, Jalal& Salim, Walid Awad& Thomas, Stephen H. 2020. The establishment of a medical toxicology consulting service for advancing care of poisoning and overdose in Qatar. Qatar Medical Journal،Vol. 2020, no. 3, pp.1-8.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-1440155

Modern Language Association (MLA)

Elmoheen, Amr…[et al.]. The establishment of a medical toxicology consulting service for advancing care of poisoning and overdose in Qatar. Qatar Medical Journal No. 3 (2020), pp.1-8.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-1440155

American Medical Association (AMA)

Elmoheen, Amr& al-Essai, Jalal& Salim, Walid Awad& Thomas, Stephen H. The establishment of a medical toxicology consulting service for advancing care of poisoning and overdose in Qatar. Qatar Medical Journal. 2020. Vol. 2020, no. 3, pp.1-8.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-1440155

Data Type

Journal Articles

Language

English

Notes

Includes bibliographical references : p. 7-8

Record ID

BIM-1440155