Study design and setting

This retrospective cross-sectional study was performed in Khorshid Hospital affiliated to Isfahan University of Medical Sciences, Isfahan, Iran. The Poisoning Emergency Department of Khorshid Hospital is a main referral center for poisoning cases in Isfahan, Central Iran. It is specifically staffed and designed exclusively for the management of poisoned patients. Patients were admitted from both primary health-care facilities as well as direct admissions. Both adult and pediatric poisoning cases admitted to the Poisoning Emergency Center. Approximately 600 patients are admitted monthly, and their initial care is managed under the supervision of a medical toxicologist and the involvement of anesthesiology, intensive care, and forensic medicine specialists. Khorshid Hospital has about 280 beds including different units such as intensive care unit, as well as medical toxicology, internal medicine (gastrointestinal, kidney, pulmonary, rheumatology), urology, cardiovascular, and psychiatry subdivisions.

The sample size for estimating incidence of pesticide poisoning was determined based on the following formula: by considering the pesticide poisoning incidence rate from previous studies as p = 0.04, type one error rate α = 0.05 (Z = 1.96) and precision d = 0.01 resulted 1474 samples. We finally analyzed data from 1567 people.^19,20