The Emergency Services Advisory Committee (ESAC) wishes to make all physicians who practise emergency medicine in British Columbia aware of recommendations from a recent (13 May 2014 [revised 30 June 2014]) BC Coroners Service Preventable Death Bulletin:*
Follow the BC Drug and Poison Information Centre (DPIC) protocol for the treatment of a methadone overdose:
• Asymptomatic patients with suspected [methadone] overdose and children ingesting any amount should be monitored for at least 10 hours.
• Symptomatic patients should be monitored until all symptoms resolve; observe for resedation for at least 6 hours and, concludes the Coroner,* up to 10 hours after the last dose of naloxone.
• Call the DPIC when a patient with poison and overdose presents at the ED (24 hours: 604 682-5050 or 1 800 567-8911).
*The full bulletin, including the DPIC protocol for the treatment of a methadone overdose, is posted on the Section of Emergency Medicine website (www.sem-bc.com [12]), the UBC Department of Emergency Medicine website (www.emergency.med.ubc.ca), and the BCMJ website (click here for the full bulletin [13]).
—Jim Christenson, MD
Head, UBC Department of Emergency Medicine
—David A. Haughton, MD
Chair, Doctors of BC Section of Emergency Medicine
—Roy Purssell, MD
Director of BC Poison Control
Links
[1] https://bcmj.org/cover/november-2014
[2] https://bcmj.org/author/jim-christenson-md
[3] https://bcmj.org/author/david-haughton-md
[4] https://bcmj.org/author/roy-purssell-md-frcpc
[5] https://bcmj.org/node/5262
[6] https://bcmj.org/sites/default/files/BCMJ_56_Vol9_pulsimeter_2.pdf
[7] https://bcmj.org/print/news/bc-coroners-service-emergency-medicine-recommendation
[8] https://bcmj.org/printmail/news/bc-coroners-service-emergency-medicine-recommendation
[9] http://www.facebook.com/share.php?u=https://bcmj.org/print/news/bc-coroners-service-emergency-medicine-recommendation&via=BCMedicalJrnl&tw_p=tweetbutton&via=BCMedicalJrnl&tw_p=tweetbutton&via=BCMedicalJrnl&tw_p=tweetbutton
[10] https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?text=BC Coroners Service: Emergency medicine recommendation&url=https://bcmj.org/print/news/bc-coroners-service-emergency-medicine-recommendation&via=BCMedicalJrnl&tw_p=tweetbutton&via=BCMedicalJrnl&tw_p=tweetbutton&via=BCMedicalJrnl&tw_p=tweetbutton&via=BCMedicalJrnl&tw_p=tweetbutton
[11] https://bcmj.org/javascript%3A%3B
[12] http://www.sem-bc.com/
[13] https://bcmj.org/sites/default/files/public/puls-BC-Coroner-Bulletin-nov-14.pdf
[14] https://bcmj.org/modal_forms/nojs/webform/176
[15] https://bcmj.org/%3Finline%3Dtrue%23citationpop