Acute pesticides poisonings in pregnant women.

K Sancewicz-Pach, B Groszek, D Pach, M Kłys

Index: Prz. Lek. 54(10) , 741-4, (1997)

Full Text: HTML

Abstract

44 pregnant women were treated at the Department of Clinical Toxicology in years 1986-1996 as a result of acute poisonings with different xenobiotics. Acute pesticide poisoning that involved 4 cases were always severe and had dramatic clinical course. Carbofuran intoxication stated in a 17-year-old woman (18 weeks of pregnancy) resulted in fetus death. Toxicological findings revealed that the level of the poison in the mothers blood was comparable to that in the fetus. Carbofuran evidently passed the placental barrier in concentration which was sufficient to cause the fetus death. In the second woman (20-year-old, 12 weeks pregnant) who was classified as severely poisoned on admission to the clinic a spontaneous abortion was stated on 27th day after poisoning. The highest level of carbofuran in the blood of the mother was 9.71 micrograms/g. A 30-year-old woman, 10 weeks pregnant took formothion (50 ml) per vaginam in order to provoke abortion. She was classified as moderately poisoned. Gynecological examination and ultrasonography confirmed the pregnancy. The fetus heart tones were audible. The patient was discharged from hospital after 3 days at her own request in a good general condition. The concentration of formothion in washings from vagina was similar to the levels observed in blood serum on the patient admission to the Clinic, and 24 hour later. A 21-year-old woman, 5 month pregnant ingested an unknown amount of endosulfan to provoke abortion. Gynecological examination and abdominal ultrasonography revealed longitudinal pelvic presentation of fetus. Neither fetal movement nor heart tones were audible as early as four hours after the clinical symptoms occurred. Such low concentration of endosulfan in the blood of the mother as 0.47 microgram/g of the poison caused relatively quick fetus death. The highest levels of endosulfan were found in the liver and in the fetus kidneys.