[Prognostic factors in acute paraquat poisoning. A retrospective study of cases registered by the Poison Control Center of Paris in 1981].

Twenty years after the publication of the first cases, the intoxication with the herbicide Paraquat still has a low prognosis because of no efficient treatment. But many studies have allowed the definition of prognostic factors. Nearly, BISMUTH and als(2) demonstrated that the following criteria are significant: the oral route, the gastric lesions, the organic renal failure, the plasma-Paraquat concentration. Through a series of cases collected in 1981 at the Poison Control Center of Paris, the following prognostic factors have been studied: route of administration, sex of patient, circumstances of the poisoning, ingested volume, concentration of the solution, existence of an emetic in the commercial solution, gastric content, lesions of the upper digestive tract (mouth, oesophagus, stomach), renal impairment, hepatic failure, blood gasometry, lung function tests, plasma and urine paraquat concentrations. Forty-one cases were collected during this period, with thirty-four concerning acute Paraquat poisonings in humans. We studied twenty-seven of them caused by acute oral poisoning, with accidental circumstances in nine cases (two died) and intentional circumstances in eighteen cases (all died) (other cases concerned two ocular projections, four inhalations and one skin projection). The interest of this new investigation is the particularity of our series. Because of our recruitment (larger geographic distribution of patients, larger diversity of circumstances, of routes of administration, of ingested quantities, of treatments...). This series of cases is quite different from others previously published. This study confirms the validity of prognostic factors defined by BISMUTH and als(2). The factors, which look significant, strictly depend on the ingested quantity.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)