Articles related to POISONING/OVERDOSE

According to the FDA, more than 101,000 fatal overdoses were reported during the 12-month period that ended in October 2022. Nearly half of fatal overdoses involve bystanders, but naloxone is only used in a small percentage of those situations. According to medical professionals who support the approval, there would be a critical opportunity to close this gap and lower the number of opioid-related deaths if naloxone were available over-the-counter.

There is no readily available test for xylazine and narcotic antagonists are ineffective. Overdosage is characterized by sedation and unresponsiveness. When combined with fentanyl, overdose symptoms can include blue-to-grayish skin, slowed breathing and bradycardia.

A possible carcinogen found in laundry detergent, 1,4-dioxane, has a regulatory limit in New York State. The toxin, which is a byproduct of the chemical processes used to create detergent, can covertly infect goods without the knowledge of consumers. Providers should buy healthy goods and consult with their patients about the household cleaning supplies they use to prevent exposure to 1,4-dioxane and other chemicals found in laundry detergents.

In 2021, melatonin was the most frequently reported substance involved in pediatric substance ingestions, resulting in 4,000 hospitalizations, 287 ICU admissions, and 2 deaths in children under the age of 2. Melatonin supplements can have 500% more melatonin than indicated on the label and about 30% of OTC products tested had serotonin as well.

In 2019, the FDA warned that gabapentin might cause serious breathing difficulties when used with drugs that depress the central nervous system. The warning may have not been heeded, as overdose deaths in which gabapentin was detected doubled from 449 in the first quarter of 2019 to 959 in the second quarter of 2020.

As use of gabapentin in the United States has been steadily increasing in recent years, researchers from the CDC have found that, among the 62,652 overdose deaths that occurred between 2019 and 2020, 58,362 of these cases had documented toxicology results.