Publications by authors named "Amanda Holford"
Article Synopsis
- Ethylene glycol (EG) poisoning can lead to severe complications if not diagnosed quickly, as traditional testing methods like Gas Chromatography (GC) may be slow and unavailable.
- Point-of-care lactate tests often show falsely elevated results in EG cases, but the lactate gap (difference between POCT and automated results) can act as a useful marker for diagnosing EG toxicity across various laboratories.
- A case study highlights that combining elevated lactate gap, high anion gap metabolic acidosis, and osmolar gap allowed for rapid recognition of EG poisoning, leading to effective treatment and improved patient outcomes.
Objective: To determine if patients presenting to our toxicology unit following self-reported heroin use had positive urine immunoassay testing for fentanyl or its analogues.
Methods: Urine samples from consenting patients were tested at the bedside for the presence of opiates or fentanyl and its analogues.
Results: Over a 30-month period, 58 patients were recruited.
Introduction: Anticholinergic agents are commonly taken in overdose, often causing delirium. The spectrum of anticholinergic delirium ranges from mild agitation to severe behavioural disturbance. Physostigmine is an effective treatment for anticholinergic delirium, but its availability is limited.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFIntroduction: Poppy seed tea is used for its opioid effects and contains multiple opium alkaloids, including morphine, codeine, papaverine, and thebaine. Animal studies indicate thebaine has strychnine-like properties, but there is limited literature describing human thebaine poisoning. We describe a cluster of acute thebaine poisoning in people ingesting tea made using poppy seeds with high thebaine content that entered the Australian food supply chain.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: To investigate the impact of QScript implementation on pregabalin-related poisoning presentations to the ED.
Methods: This is a retrospective review of pregabalin-related poisoning presentations to a tertiary Australian ED in the 4 years prior to, and 1 year following the introduction of QScript real-time prescription monitoring system.
Results: Pregabalin-related poisoning presentations fell by 28% from an average of 98 presentations annually over the 4 years prior to QScript implementation to 71 in 2022.