Oral factors in accidental poisoning.

Perverted appetite as a contributory cause of poisoning has previously excited comment but largely in connexion with poisoning by lead (Burrows, Rendle-Short and Hanna, 1951). Evidence of pica appears, usually without comment, in the cases of other poisoned children. For example, Davis and Hunt (1949) were unable to carry out successful gastric lavage on a child poisoned by an antihistamine as the stomach contained a heterogeneous mass of vegetable matter, and Prain (1950) found a plastic toy in the caecum of another poisoned child. However, exaggerated oral tendencies may not go as far as pica, and the present paper considers the degrees of oral abnormality to be found in children who have poisoned themselves.