Background: Acute poisoning is a common situation in emergency departments all over the world. It may cause severe complications and death. Treatment of these cases requires great medical care and significant costs. There are many differences with respect to the pattern and cause of acute poisoning between geographical regions, even within the same country.
Objective: This study was carried out to assess the pattern of acute poisoning with drugs, chemicals and natural toxins in both adults and children in Kafr El - Sheikh Governorate hospitals.
Methods: The study was conducted onacutely intoxicated cases admitted to some of Kafr El - Sheikh Governorate hospitals. The medical records of cases who were admitted due to acute poisoning from January 2015 to January 2017 were reviewed retrospectively.
Results: This study included 1046 acute poisoned cases presented to ED. There were 85% less than 6 years old and 15 % more than 12 years old. .Number of males with toxic exposure was 421 while that of females was 625. Pharmacological agents, constituted the highest percentage of the poisoning (28.92%), followed by Insecticides (24.4 %), household products (20.45 %), food poisoning (12.5 %) and animal poisoning (8.03%).The majority of cases of acute poisoning were accidental (78.01%), followed by attempted suicide (21.98%).The majority of cases stayed at the hospital (51.9 %), while (40.8 %) Discharged from ED and about (7.2%) referred to nearest poison centers. 1027 patients (98.18%) recovered, only 1.3% developed complications.
Conclusion: Accidental poisoning is still a significant cause of morbidity. Regarding the high prevalenceofpharmaceuticaldrugandhouseholdproductspoisoninginchildren, implementation of legislations to ban over the counter selling of medications and to sell potentially dangerous chemicals in childproof containers is recommended. Improving proper and complete medical record-keeping is also suggested for a better information access.