engleski

Toxic Household Chemicals

Household chemicals are relatively unknown area for the majority of physicians who treat poisoning. Because of that ingestion or other exposure to household chemicals provoke more concern and use of more energetic therapy than is necessary. Therefore we strongly recommend that in such cases a physician consult Poison Control Center in order to get proper information about chemical composition and toxicity for every product. Out of 4736 poisonings registered in the Poison Control Center in Zagreb from 1985 to 1999, 22,9% were caused by so called household chemicals. It is a heterogeneous group of products that we divided according to its use into four groups: cleaning products, organic solvents, cosmetics and other household chemicals. In the group of cleaning products, with respect to chemical composition, 12% of poisonings were caused by corrosives, i.e. strong acids or alkalis, 9% by liquid detergents (mostly dish-washing) and 4% by hypochlorit. Organic solvents cause 18% of household chemical poisoning; among them ingestions of gasoline and thinner are the most frequent and those caused by paint, varnish, glues and similar products with high percentage of solvents are seldom. Cosmetics are responsible for 7% of poisoning with household chemicals; the most frequent are hair shampoo, hydrogenperoxid and aceton. In the group of other chemicals ingestions of potentially non-toxic mercury from thermometer and silicagel are very common, while poisonings with highly toxic antifreeze, mothballs or liquid fertilizers are relatively rare.

Poison Control Center; household chemicals; poisoning

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