Instructions for handling when suffering from mercury poisoning

This is an automatically translated article.

The article is professionally consulted by Master, Doctor Vu Huu Thang - Emergency Resuscitation Doctor - Emergency Resuscitation Department - Vinmec Ha Long International General Hospital. The doctor has nearly 10 years of experience in Emergency Resuscitation.
Mercury poisoning does not have a natural or at-home detox. Infected people need to be examined and tested for mercury poisoning early to get an accurate diagnosis and timely detoxification treatment if necessary.

1. How dangerous is mercury poisoning?

Mercury is a metal that is liquid under normal conditions, is insoluble in water, and can evaporate relatively easily at room temperature. Mercury is used in some factories, chemicals or even in many essential items such as thermometers, sphygmomanometers, light bulbs...
Compounds of the element mercury in the form of vapors and salts are very toxic, can cause brain, liver damage, ... if people accidentally breathe, contact or ingest. Mercury also attacks the central nervous system, affects the mouth, jaw muscles, teeth and even causes birth defects.
Mercury poisoning can be caused by many causes, such as inhalation of mercury vapors, ingestion of mercury, or chronic poisoning from eating seafood with high organic mercury content,... Exposure in children The most common problem is when a broken mercury thermometer is not handled properly, causing mercury poisoning.

2. How to handle mercury poisoning

Currently, mercury poisoning does not have a natural or at-home detox. Therefore, if there are warning signs of mercury poisoning, people need to go to a medical facility immediately for accurate diagnosis and timely detoxification treatment, to avoid possible complications.
The doctor will rely on clinical symptoms, assess the respiratory and circulatory status, test for mercury poisoning to check the level of mercury in the blood to assess the patient's intoxication status.
Mercury poisoning due to different causes, the level of danger will also be different. Therefore, in the unfortunate event of being exposed to mercury, it is important to stay calm to handle it properly to minimize the danger.
Treatment of mercury poisoning before going to the hospital includes the following basic steps:
With the patient breathing in mercury vapor, they should quickly get out of the mercury area. If it is a small room, it is necessary to close the door of the room to prevent mercury from being dispersed into the environment. If your child accidentally swallows liquid mercury: While waiting to get to the nearest medical facility, give your child plenty of water to drink. With mercury in contact through the skin: Need to immediately remove toxins from the skin by: Need to clean, wash hands with soap and water or wash eyes with physiological saline. Should change all clothes in case mercury gets on the body. To clean clothes contaminated with mercury, soak in cold water and soapy water at a temperature of 70 - 80 degrees Celsius, soak for another 20 minutes at high temperature in water mixed with bleach, then rinse with water. Dispose of recently used cleaning tools such as brooms, trash cans or gloves in a sealed plastic bag with a note on the outside to avoid bad things for others.

3. Handling mercury poisoning in some specific cases

3.1. Mercury poisoning by inhalation of mercury vapor Inhaling mercury vapor is the most dangerous cause of poisoning, because mercury is a volatile metal that, when heated, forms toxic compounds. Exposure to high concentrations of highly elemental mercury vapor causes acute health effects.
Acute inhalation of mercury poisoning often causes pneumonia symptoms, patients will have very early, clear symptoms from the beginning. Typical common symptoms are cough and shortness of breath, headache. It is not necessary to breathe in mercury vapor or pass through an area where mercury vapor is present to require hospitalization. However, if there are signs above, it is best for people to go to a medical center immediately to be checked and evaluated for their poisoning.
The most important thing in this case is to quickly get away from the source of mercury vapor, especially where the temperature is high, allowing the mercury to evaporate more strongly.
3.2. Broken mercury thermometer Ingestion of elemental mercury usually does not cause systemic toxicity. According to some experts, elemental mercury, when swallowed, is only absorbed by 0.01% through the healthy intestine. A few days later, the mercury followed its natural route out without causing any symptoms of poisoning. It is only dangerous, causing acute poisoning when the intestinal tract is perforated and the peritoneum absorbs them.
Therefore, if the mercury thermometer is unfortunately broken, the parents should calmly handle the situation, do not cause children to swallow more mercury or choke on mercury.
Below are the doctor's advice on how to handle mercury poisoning due to broken thermocouple.
Mercury collection
The first thing, is to wear gloves or plastic wrap to collect the mercury particles on the floor spilled with a thin card or with a strip of tape, thin paper, can also be used Empty plastic bottles to suck them up. After that, continue to use a damp rag to clean the floor, then put the mercury separately, put a damp rag in a bag and seal it.. After being collected, it must be kept in a sealed container to avoid pouring mercury down the drain because it can cause damage. water pollution.

Never use a mercury vacuum cleaner: Metallic mercury is toxic when it vaporizes and inhales it. Because when sucked, it will generate heat, mercury vaporizes, spreads quickly in a closed room environment, causing danger. One of the measures to prevent this situation is not to let children suck on a mercury thermometer to avoid the thermometer breaking. Use extreme caution when using medical equipment that contains mercury, especially when used with young children. Instead, parents can use safer electronic medical devices. Currently on the market there are many types of electronic thermometers capable of giving results with very high accuracy within 1 second, especially can measure when the child is sleeping, convenient, do not have to worry if the baby moves Stirring will give inaccurate results or risk breakage like a mercury thermometer.
3.3. With cases of chronic mercury poisoning, chronic mercury poisoning is usually caused by food sources or the surrounding environment such as contaminated soil, water, and air. In this case, in addition to going to a medical center to assess for mercury poisoning, it is also important to eliminate the source of exposure.
Eliminating contaminated food, changing water sources or even temporarily moving from the area where you live are measures that may have to be considered depending on the degree of contamination, the family's condition and capabilities .

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