The Saudi Journal of Forensic Medicine and Sciences

Export selected to

Endnote

Reference Manager

Procite

Medlars Format

RefWorks Format

BibTex Format

Background: Organophosphorus (OP) poisoning is a common health problem. Its diagnosis depends on clinical findings. The main treatment of OP poisonings is atropine and oximes. However, new adjunct therapy such as magnesium sulfate (MgSO₄) has been introduced. Materials and Methods: To detect the effects of MgSO₄, a case–control study was conducted on 100 patients intoxicated with OP compounds. All patients received standard care of treatment while half of them received MgSO₄ given in a dose of 1 g/6 h for 24 h. Results: The given atropine and oximes doses, hospitalization period, and incidence of complications, especially cardiac arrhythmias, respiratory failure, and death were significantly reduced in Mg-treated group. Conclusion: Results suggest that magnesium could ameliorate OP toxic effects and could be considered in the management of patients intoxicated with these compounds.

Bitemarks are the tool marks left by the action of teeth and other oral structure during biting of the objects and people. Bitemarks can occur on both victims and the assailants. It has an important role in the identification of suspect, especially in cases of interpersonal fights, sexual assault, and child abuse. The key for successful bitemark analysis is the proper and timely collection of bitemark evidence following the standardized guidelines as bitemarks heal and fade with time. The consequence of improper forensic dental evidence collection leads to miscarriage of justice. Here, we present and discuss a case where medical intervention before collection of the bitemark evidence on the ear resulted in the failure of delivery of appropriate bitemark analysis and justice to the victim.

Background: India is facing a massive dearth of organs for transplantation. Nationally, with a population of 1.2 billion people, the organ donation rate (ODR) per million population (PMP) for India stands at 0.26 PMP. Although limited knowledge is considered as one of the major factors for low donation rates, studies also quote that knowledge may not have any impact on positive attitude and practice toward organ donation. Furthermore, countries with presumed consent policy like the one in Spain and Croatia have much higher ODRs (36 and 36.5 PMP) as compared to India, which has informed consent policy. Objectives: The objectives of this study is to understand correlation between knowledge and attitude toward organ donation among medical and nonmedical students and identify barriers to deceased organ donation; to look into participant's perception for adoption of presumed consent policy in Indian context; and understanding the acceptance of donor acknowledgment in the form of organ incentivization. Materials and Methods: An institution-based cross-sectional study was carried out among the students of medical and engineering colleges. A total of 100 students from each institute were interviewed randomly constituting a total sample of 600 students. A pre-designed, pre-tested, semi-structured questionnaire was used for collecting the data. The collected data were entered into Epi Info 7, and statistical tests were applied to find significant differences between two groups. Results: Of the total 600 students, 55.7% were male while 44.3% were female. The mean age of the study population was 19.73 ± 1.24 standard deviation years with majority of them (90.5%) under 21 years. Age and gender found to have a significant association with knowledge on organ donation. Study revealed a positive correlation between knowledge and attitude in both medical (r = 0.189) and nonmedical groups (r = 0.21). Almost 51.7% of students were in favor of adoption of Spain's “opt-out policy” policy, while 82.6% supported donor acknowledgment to increase the rates of organ donation in India. Most common source of information about organ donation identified in the study was television (71%), newspaper (38.5%), and doctor (33.7%). Conclusion: Positive correlation between knowledge and attitude suggests that a well-designed awareness campaign can improve attitude and practice toward organ donation, and successful examples from countries such as Spain and Singapore can be adopted in national context, to increase ODRs and saving millions of lives waiting for organs from deceased donors.

Online since 17^th January, 2017