Author: Aaron Lessen, MD

Educational Pearl:

• A double ingestion of a single pill is typically a benign event but several drug classes may cause problems
• A published review of 10 years of single medication double dose ingestion found 12 out of 876 cases had adverse events. The drugs and events were:
• • Propafenone ingestion leading to ventricular tachycardia
  • Beta blocker ingestion leading to bradycardia and hypotension
  • Calcium channel blocker leading to bradycardia and hypotension
  • Bupropion ingestion leading to seizures
  • Tramadol ingestion leading to ventricular tachycardia

Editor's Note:

References:

Correia MS, Whitehead E, Cantrell FL, Lasoff DR, Minns AB. A 10-year review of single medication double-dose ingestions in the nation's largest poison control system. Clin Toxicol (Phila). 2019 Jan;57(1):31-35. doi: 10.1080/15563650.2018.1493205. Epub 2018 Nov 28. PubMed PMID: 30484705.

Summarized by Travis Barlock, MS4 | Edited by Erik Verzemnieks, MD