Further to the discussion on thyroxine overdose, while I have never been
asked to deal with that, I have, over the years, had some fairly rum
requests following junior medical staff telephoning a "poisons centre"
(unspecified). The local poisons centre in Newcastle has now issued
guidelines for the clinical management of common overdoses, including
which laboratory investigations should be done in given cases including
requests for assays (for drugs) which are simply not available. While
this is laudable, we still find that these guidelines are not being
followed, and we still recieve unusual requests following a telephone
call to a "poisons centre".
Am I alone in thinking that it is about time somebody took a good hard
look at the quality and appropriateness of the advice offered? In my
experience, the advice usually comes from somebody sitting in front of a
database.
David Williams
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