Important to Forensic Medicine Trends in Hospital Admissions Due to Intoxications with Narcotic Substances (T40 ICD-10) in the Lower Silesia Region of Poland in the Years 2006-2012

Being aware of the importance of statistical structure of poisonings for directing of toxicological analyses both in clinical and especially forensic medicine, the study was aimed at finding current incidence of narcotic substances intoxications in the Lower Silesia region of Poland as well as determining any long time trends. Data on causes of hospital admissions because of poisoning by narcotics and psychodysleptics (T40 according to ICD-10) in the years 2006-2012, made available due to courtesy of the public healthcare insurance provider Narodowy Fundusz Zdrowia in Lower Silesia region of Poland (NFZ), were analyzed. The study revealed that in the years 2001-2012 the causes of intoxications with narcotic substances in the Lower Silesia region of Poland have been changing in a consistent way. In the years 2006-2012 the total amount of hospital admissions caused by narcotic substances intoxications increased significantly. The amount of intoxications with opioids, and especially opiates, dropped but they have been practically fully replaced by methadone poisonings. The incidence of cannabis and cannabinoids abuse cases increased, as well as the incidence of serious intoxications with unspecified and/or synthetic narcotic substances. Cocaine and lysergide intoxications resulting in the hospitalizations were casuistic. The increased share of intoxications with untypical or synthetic narcotic substances among the acute poisonings cases in the Lower Silesia region of Poland makes establishing the proper diagnosis difficult or, in some cases, even renders it practically impossible at all.