Atropine Poisoning... On Way To Med Center. But....

[bina]

one of our thai workers came across an epipen with 2mg atropine, a relic of our gas mask kits... some how left in a bucket somewhere in the orchards... being curious, he opened the pen and inadvertantly injected himself.... aprt from dizziness, nausea and trembles, he seems fine but employer and worker are off to the emt along with epipen...

would like if someone could find me some simple terms in thai about atropine and EPIPENS, etc... he wont die, he isnt the only one to have injected himself by accident/on purpose the dosage is meant for an adult (actually caant remember they were colour coded by age/dosage) neutralizing the main effects of nerve gas and during our last wars and almost wars many people here have done the same thing... just want to explain to him, afterwards, what it was and that sort of thing.

for all i know, his reaction could be just psychological since the last time we were issued with these things was almost 5 yrs ago and they have a 'use by' date, then it becomes less effective. also, notsure how much he really injected or just stabbed himself since it was in his finger! usually u have to really jab it in your thigh or butt...he was more paranoid about poice reports since its a poison...

google is not my friend, as it uses too complicated a medical vocab for a country thai to understand...

any takers..? again, its not an emergency... he is being taken care of... just want some info for prevention as we are again getting those kits handed out to us, dont want a repeat.

thancx

bina

israel

[Sheryl]

I think you mean an AtroPen, not an EpiPen?

EPIPENs contain adrenaline (epinephrine), not atropine. Useful for allergic reactions but probably not for a gas attack.

Afraid I don't know of a source of info in Thai. AtroPens are not used in Thailand so no hope of getting a package insert from one.

[katana]

Atropine in Thai is อะโทรปีน, so as a start you could try Googling that.

Couldn't really find anything in Thai Wikipedia about it, although from the English version, although poisonous, 2 mg seems well within the safe dose.

Good luck.

[bina]

yes sheryl an atropine pen.. but here we all call it epipen as a generic term for one of those automatic injectors.just shows how languages changed interpretation and understanding of things...

these are army issue, therefore no safety data/poison control info.

katana, yes, 2 mg is the initial dose given for during nerve gas exposure, then if two hours have past or person is symtpmatic higher doses are given along with other stuff, once in a hospital situation. because the margin for error is so high when dealing with panicked civilians who dont follow instructions, the dose has to be enough to give initial protection, but not enough to actually cause major poisoning unless u suffer a heart problem or a child gets the adult dose. (i was a house mother in a boarding school for troubled kids during our first gulf war, so was trained in all this lovely stuff since obvioiusly the first thing problem kids would do was stab each other with the things but were required to have them on their person during that particular time ... )

the outcome this morning was: 2 mg yellow pen(meant for adults), from five years ago, curious thai worker opens it, it sprang into his finger (must have hurt sincem eant to be shot in to muscle area), he got the shakes, dry mouth, nauesea, felt uncomfortable, but by the time he got to the emt, he felt better, didnt need IV fluids, his heart beat was fine... sent to stay at home for the day since causes tiredness and also overheating...the reason no one ran immediately is that his main employer is an officer in reserves so was familiar with the stuff.also, actually a rather, if not common, not entirely uncommon problem here since we all have emergency gas mask, etc kits in every house, and they have a pile of them in their lodgings... so qutie a few people, mostly kids and old folks stabbed themselves either on purpose or by accident or in a panic, at various times when our 'preperation level' was on high alert in the past. therefore many of us are familiar with dealing with 'accidental' injections.

either way, he was checked out and all is ok. he opened the thing cause he wanted to see what it was.!!

this is from the last time we got them:

this evening my hsuband asked him what he was thinking: he said he was mostly afraid to die, and wouldnt see the faces of his wife and kids again... although we were relaxed and calm when explaining to him what the stuff was, and what will happen in the emrgency treatment clinic,he got himslef in a panic . he also refused to go with only his employer, so a thai co worker was convineced to go with (still considered 'work', i.e. still getting his hours. )

will be good for laughs in the next week or so......

will now get hubby to google in thai...

[FBN]

Curiosity and all that..!!

Atropine does not have a very significant half life and 2 mg should be fine.

Treatment of organophosphate poisoning sometimes can require up to 60mg of IV Atropine over 36-48h.