Læknablaðið : fylgirit - 15.06.2002, Page 29

POSTERS / ICELAND 2002: EMERGENCY MEDICINE BETWEEN CONTINENTS
large amount of intracranial hemorrhage. He was treated conserva-
tively in the intensive care unit and was discharged as a hopeless
case.
Conclusion: The ED physician should always be aware of the
possibility of neurologic incident in hypothermic patients.
P 36 - Toxicology
Web-based and PDA-based chemical hazard query system for
chemical disaster
Chang CY
Taichung Veterans General Hospital, Taiwan
Objective: Chemical disasters have the characteristics of being fast-
extended as well as being widespread. Chances are that accidents
happen and cause disasters if the emergency personnel are short of
sufficient protection facilities and enough rescue knowledge. This
project is aimed to build up a portable query tool via PDA in order
to speed up the process of recognizing chemical hazard materials
and thus to reduce the mortality and morbidity of disasters.
Mcthods and rcsults:
1. Establish a database containing 65 factories in Taichung City
and the possible chemical hazard materials.
2. Establish a database containing chemical characteristics and
their response methods. Two hundred and thirty-four items are
listed.
3. Construct an easy-to-use PDA-based chemical toxics database
management system. It can help to identify the toxics according
to the factory, or the characterislics of the chemicals.
4. Construct a web-based chemical database management system
by taking advantage of the GIS.
5. Link the web-based chemical database management system with
disaster hospital system which was built up in 2000.
Conclusion: This project is aimed to help make quick and right
decisions when chemical accidents happen. It provides complete
information about possible hazardous chemicals and their response
methods by taking advantage of PDA, the GIS and the Internet
Information. The project is feasible; however, several points need
to be taken into consideration:
1. To build up a real time database containing possible chemical
hazard materials in the whole country
2. To build up a virtual drilling system on Internet for disaster
management exercise.
3. This rnodule can be applied to other circumstances such as
emergency responses to accidents, etc.
P 37 - Toxicology
Medical problems related to recreational drug use at dance
parties in Ghent, Belgium
Rousseau FM, Calle PA, Van Sassenbroeck DK, Van Brantegem J*,
Monsieurs KG, Verstraete AG
Ghent University Hospital and ’Belgian Ministry of Health, Bclgium
Objective: A marked increase has occurred in past years in the
frequency of drug-related medical problems at nocturnal dance
parties. Especially, rave parties are associated with excessive con-
sumption of illicit drugs such as ecstasy and gamma-hydroxybu-
tyrate (GHB). In this study on drug-related medical problems we
compared "I love techno” (event A), i.e. one of Europe's largest
Presenting symptom Event A (n=61) Event B (n=18)
Coma 9 (GHB: 6, ecstasy: 2, ethanol: 1}
Agitation/anxiety 9 (ecstasy: 8, cocaine: 1) i (ecstasy: 1)
Epileptic fit 5 (ecstasy: 4, GHB: 1) —
Syncope 9 (ecstasy: 5, ethanol: 3, amphet.: 1)
Vomiting/ abdominal pain 14 (ethanol: 9, ecstasy: 3, amphet.: 1, cannabis: 1) 5 (ethanol: 5)
Muscle cramps 1 (amphet.: 1) —
Chest pain 2 (cocaine: 1, amphet.: 1) —
Drunk 9 (ethanol: 9) 12 (ethanol: 12)
Headache 2 (cocaine: 1, amphet.: 1) —
Asthma attack 1 (ecstasy: 1) —
Note: When a combination of drugs was assumed, only the most dominant drug is mentioned.
rave parties attended by 37,000 people, with “De Nacht” (event B),
i.e. a traditional New Year's Eve party held at the same location and
attended by 12,000 people.
Methods: For both events, data on all patients evaluated in a
medical station nearby the dance hall and/or in an emergency
department of one of the four surrounding hospitals were regis-
tered prospectively. Data on drug use were based on information
provided by the patient (or a bystander), the clinical presentation
and standardized toxicological screening. These blood samples
were screened for amphetamine, ecstasy, cocaine, ethanol, canna-
bis, paramethoxyamphetamine, opiates and GHB.
Results: During event A and event B, the numbers of patients
treated were 246 (66.5/10,000 attendants) and 84 (70.0/10,000
attendants) respectively. The numbers of patients with drug-related
medical problems were 61 for event A (16.5/10,000 attendants) and
18 for event B (15.0/10,000 altendants). Details on these drug-
related problems among attendees of both events are presented in
the table.
The number of intoxicated patients in need of an evaluation in
an emergency department was 18 for event A (4.9/10,000 atten-
dees) and 4 for event B (3.3/10,000 attendees). In these patients the
dominant drug abused was ecstasy (n=8) or GHB (n=7) during
event A and ethanol (n=3) or ecstasy (n=l) during event B.
Conclusion: The incidence of medical problems is almost equal in
both dance parties. However, at rave parties mainly illicit drugs are
abused, more frequently leading to severe intoxications.
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