Epidemiology of Child Poisoning in Iran; a Systematic Review

Poisoning is one of the most common causes of visits to hospital emergency departments in many countries. Considering the prevalence of poisoning in Iran, this study aims to investigate the epidemiology of child poisoning in Iran as a systematic review study.

The present study is a systematic review. Studies published in Persian on the epidemiology of child poisoning were searched using Persian keywords translating to "poisoning", "children", and "poisoning in children" and examined using the Prisma checklist. Searches were performed in Google scholar, Sid, and Magiran databases to find studies published in the period from 2001 to 2020.

After searching, screening, and qualitatively evaluating the studies during the systematic review, in the end, syntheses were performed on 21 articles. In terms of gender, in 20 studies, poisoning had a higher prevalence among boys and in one study the prevalence was higher in girls. The highest prevalence of poisoning was observed among children under 3 years of age. Also, in terms of the prevalence of poisoning in various seasons, one study reported the highest prevalence in spring, 6 studies in summer, and 2 studies in autumn. The toxic agent was reported to be medication in 10 studies, opium in 8 studies, and hydrocarbons (oil) in 3 studies. The most common cause of poisoning was accidental in 17 studies and intentional in one study.

The results of this study showed that medication poisoning is the most common cause of poisoning in Iran and has increased in recent years. Considering the fact that most of the poisonings in the studies were accidental, it is necessary to inform parents about the proper storage of medications and also paying attention to the labels of medications.