Fatal Intoxications in the North of Portugal: 12 Years of Retrospective Analysis

• Tipo: Artigo em Revista Científica Internacional
• Data: 2017

Autores

Alves, EA (Autor) Outra; Brandao, P (Autor) Outra; Teresa Magalhães (Autor) FMUP; Felix Carvalho (Autor) FFUP; Ricardo Jorge Dinis Oliveira (Autor) FMUP

Revista

Título: Current Drug Safety

Vol. 12

Páginas: 39-45

ISSN: 1574-8863

Editora: Bentham Science

Indexação

ISI Web of Knowledge - 1 Citação

Scopus - 0 Citações

Outras Informações

ID Authenticus: P-00M-E9C

DOI: 10.2174/1574886311666160724212407

Abstract (EN): Background: Fatal intoxications are a topic of great relevance in today's society. They typically occur by accidental or voluntary ingestion, but its characterization by a forensic perspective was not fully explored. Objective: This study retrospectively reviews fatal intoxication cases autopsied at the northern forensic medicine services of Portugal, between 2001 and 2013. Method: For this purpose, we analyzed postmortem forensic medical reports with positive qualitative analysis for xenobiotics. Results: A total of 27,778 autopsy reports were analyzed, of which 1,269 cases fulfilled the selection criteria, representing 4.6% of total number of individuals autopsied during the period under analysis. Men were involved in most of the cases (73.8%) and most individuals were adults with ages between 36 and 65 years old (57.0%). The highest incidences were medicines (22.9%) and alcohol (15.8%), followed by their association. Cases of fatal intoxications involving opioids come on fifth place (5.8%) namely due to accidental overdoses. Moreover, intoxications appeared as the leading cause of death in reports concerning accidental etiology, with drugs and alcohol associations having a great expression. Conclusion: Due to morbidity and relevant number of fatal cases, risk prevention measures, such as public health policies should be implemented to reduce the number of intoxications.

Idioma: Inglês

Tipo (Avaliação Docente): Científica

Nº de páginas: 7