Elderly patients visiting the emergency department for deliberate self-poisoning: do they present a more severe poisoning severity score than the nonelderly patients in the initial 24 h?

• Published in: Aging clinical and experimental research 2019-08, Vol.31 (8), p.1139-1146
• Main Authors: Hong, Sungyoup, Lee, Woon Jeong, Kim, Dae Hee, Seol, Seung Hwan, Lee, June Young, In, Sang Kook, Lee, Hye Won, Woo, Seon Hee, Wee, Jung Hee
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adult; Age; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Cardiovascular disease; Emergency Service, Hospital; Female; Geriatrics/Gerontology; Hospitalization; Humans; Intensive Care Units; Male; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Middle Aged; Original Article; Poisoning; Retrospective Studies; Suicide, Attempted; Suicides & suicide attempts
• ISSN: 1720-8319; 1594-0667; 1720-8319
• DOI: 10.1007/s40520-018-1053-3

Purpose Many elderly patients arrive at the emergency department (ED) complaining of deliberate self-poisoning (DSP). This study determined the poisoning severity of elderly patients who committed DSP. Methods A study was performed with 1329 patients (> 15 years of age) who were treated for DSP at two EDs between January 2010 and December 2016. We classified these patients into two groups based on age (an elderly group ≥ 65 years of age and a nonelderly group). Information was collected on age, sex, cause, ingestion time, drug type, suicide attempt history, initial poisoning severity score (PSS), final PSS, outcome, etc. Results In total, 242 (18.2%) patients were included in the elderly group, of whom 211 (86.9%) were treated for a first suicide attempt. Admission to the intensive-care unit (ICU) (43.8% vs. 25.5%) and endotracheal intubation (16.1% vs. 4.9%) occurred more frequently in the elderly group than in the nonelderly group ( p