Talk:Ethylene glycol poisoning

Incorrect picture
The picture shows ethylene glycol having a single bond, but I believe -ene means bound by a double bond. The picture needs to be updated. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.249.225.7 (talk) 17:00, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

highly toxic - slightly toxic
I have changed 'highly toxic' to 'slightly toxic'. While this may mislead some people, we would not consider table salt as 'highly toxic'. OTOH, if ethylen glycol (LD 100g, Xn) and salt were 'highly toxic', what would we call sodium nitrite (food additive, LD 5g), potassium cyanide (LD 250 mg,T+), nicotine (LD 70 mg,T+)? Darsie from german wiki pedia (talk) 14:35, 9 January 2009 (UTC)

Poor language in a GA article??
I don't know if this was overlooked and added in after GA status was acheived, but in the very first paragraph a couple lines down this sentence appears: "major cause of toxicity is not the ethylene glycol itself but the metabolites of ethylene glycol when it is metabolized." Does this not sound a bit redundant, the root word metabolite is used twice, as is ethylene glycol?

I don't edit much and i am not wikipedia savvy so i don't want to mess with a GA article, but i think that sentence needs to be scrapped, or at the very least "when its metabolized" should be cut. --65.189.212.147 (talk) 15:57, 16 January 2009 (UTC)
 * I agree and changed it. Don't worry about messing with a GA article, if it can be improved just be bold and change it, it's the encyclopedia that anyone can edit so just go for it. Cheers M r Bungle |  talk  22:01, 16 January 2009 (UTC)

Concerns
Have a number of concerns with this article. It recommends decontamination too strongly. Uptodate says "There is little, if any, role for gastrointestinal (GI) decontamination in methanol or ethylene glycol poisoning, as these simple alcohols are rapidly absorbed. The rare patient known to have ingested a large amount of methanol or ethylene glycol may benefit from gastric aspiration via flexible nasogastric tubing if performed within 60 minutes of the ingestion. Activated charcoal (AC), gastric lavage, and syrup of ipecac have no role in the management of toxic alcohol exposures."-- Doc James (talk · contribs · email) 03:36, 31 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Had a go at rewording it, while it is unlikely anybody would ever get deconatamination in a real world situation, I guess it is possible that someone could show up after a large ingestion within an hour. Feel free to change it about if you like. I'm not sure about the use of an empty 'history' section, hopefully you can add to that :), Cheers. M r Bungle |  talk  04:58, 31 May 2009 (UTC)

Not an inhibitor
Somebody wrote that ethanol is not an inhibitor or ADH as ADH metabolizes ethanol, technically speaking it is a competitive inhibitor, so I corrected it.174.3.107.124 (talk) 06:40, 27 November 2009 (UTC)

Mention Diethylene glycol ?
Should we mention the more? toxic Diethylene glycol in case they are confused ? Rod57 (talk) 14:10, 29 July 2010 (UTC)


 * The poisoning was caused by Diethylene glycol, not Ethylene glycol. Please read Elixir sulfanilamide, which mentions Congress passing the 1938 Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. Comfr (talk) 07:54, 28 January 2017 (UTC)

wrong crystals
Whilst you do get calcium oxalate dihydrate crystals with ethylene glycol toxicity, it is the monohydrate crystals that predominate. It may be worth changing the picture? http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/7134806 Brionyvet2 (talk) 14:03, 2 October 2013 (UTC)

Prognosis & other edits
I stopped by to add a reference, and found that there were some issues that could use further elaboration. I added some material on prevention.

I have a concern about the prognosis statement given in the introductory paragraphs: "As long as medical treatment is undertaken, the prognosis is generally good with most patients making a full recovery." The problem with this is that treatment needs to be very quick, or results are fatal. I found a reference at the Pet Poison Helpline that says "Cats must be treated within 3 hours of ingesting of antifreeze to be effective, while dogs must be treated within 8-12 hours of ingestion. Delayed treatment often is not effective, and once a dog or cat has developed kidney failure, the prognosis is poor."

The section on Signs & Symptoms talks only about treatment of humans. I'm adding information and references on signs & symptoms for pets. Also tightening up the wording a little to make it more accessible. I also tightened up the wording in the introductory section a bit, and added about the importance of getting early treatment and the poor prognosis for animals once kidney failure occurs. Added this info to the prognisis section as well.

I added a section on sources of ethylene glycol, which are more varied than mentioned so far.

Canadianknowledgelover (talk) 23:43, 11 September 2014 (UTC)

A few more edits: I'm adding an environmental section talking about release of ethylene glycol by airports in their de-icing/anti-icing operations.

The second sentence in the intro now says: "Ethylene glycol should not be confused with propylene glycol, a common food additive." Rather than this approach, which I think gives too much emphasis to the thing that ethylene glycol is not, I propose adding a note at the top of the article:

I went on over to the article for propylene glycol, to see what people would get there ... sounds like it is actually much more than a food additive. So we're not really losing out on a super concise definition ... but that's for another article and another day.

The first sentence now says: "Ethylene glycol poisoning is caused by the ingestion of ethylene glycol (the primary ingredient in both automotive antifreeze and hydraulic brake fluid)." I think the brake fluid reference is a little more remote than the antifreeze reference, so I'm going to pare that down.

Canadianknowledgelover (talk) 04:49, 13 September 2014 (UTC)

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Is this true?
In the article it was said that "Antifreeze products sometimes have a substance to make them bitter added to discourage drinking by children or animals but this has not been found to be effective."

I highly doubt if bitter substance is not effective. It is a quite common and effective measure against drinking. (Eg. Denatured alcohol) 178.244.90.130 (talk) 17:18, 15 November 2023 (UTC)