Poisoning and its Related Factors in Children under 6 Years Old in Rasht

Abstract Introduction: Poisoning is a major public health problem and one of the most common causes of child mortality, particularly in developing countries. Incidences of poisoning are variable according to the cultural and economic characteristics of particular communities. Objective: The purpose of this study was to analyze cases of poisoning in children under 6 years of age underwent hospitalization in a health center of Rasht. Materials and Methods: This study was conducted as a case-control study. The study included 2160 cases of hospitalized children under 6 years old.  The study duration was 4 months. There were 2 groups, 70 children hospitalized because of poisoning (case group) and a control group of 105 people (1.5 times that of the case group) that consisted of children under 6 years of age and , non-hospitalized. Information gathered by questionnaire included; demographic information on individuals and families, as well as method of poisoning and the child's condition after hospitalization.  Information was collected from interviews and medical records. Data were analyzed after collection using descriptive statistics (frequency distribution, means and standard deviation) and inferential statistics (chi-square tests, t-test). Results: The findings showed that most children (51.4 %) were between the ages of 1-3 years. Of the total sample 64.3 % were boys and 35.7 % were girls. In 80% of cases, poisoning was accidental and 97.1% were gastrointestinal in nature. In 51.4% cases, the cause was poisoning from medicine; 36.1% of cases were caused by methadone and in 17.1% of cases incidents had occurred in the kitchen. There was significant difference in both case and control groups in terms of father's level of education (P = 0.012) and mother's job (P = 0.025). Conclusion: Results showed that the most common cause of poisoning in children aged 1-3 was from pharmaceutical drugs; determined by the side effects of poisoning.  A low rate of parental awareness was considered to have contributed to these cases of poisoning so parental awareness was determined as significantly important for improving childcare in the study region.