The biochemical liver function tests and liver biopsy were performed in the 52 cases with acute drug intoxications who had been admitted to the department of internal medicine, National Medical Center, Seoul, Korea, for one year ranging from October 1975 to August 1976 and following results were obtained.
1) The overall sex and age incidence revealed 25 cases of male, 27 cases of female patients, and 17 cases in their second decade of age, 15 cases in third decade respectively.
2) Distribution of drugs involved revealed 42.3%
in parathion, 32.7% in rodenticide, 17.3% in sedatives and the remaining cases in other sorts of drugs. There were eight cases of mortality in parathion group, three cases in rodenticide, but none of mortality in other group.
3) In the liver function tests, there were retention of BSP (55%), increased level of SGOT (39.1%), decreased level of cholesterol (30.0%), increased bilirubin (28.6%) and increased SGPT (21.7%) in order of frequency. The disturbance of liver functions were most severe in parathion intoxications, but the severities were not directly correlated with the amounts of drugs ingested.
4) The liver biopsy, specimens showed no remarkable specific findings on light microscopy and there was even less difference in histology between each other drug intoxication. Microscopic findings showed hyperplasia of Kupffer´s cell, focal inflammation in lobules, cloudy swelling and necrosis of cytoplasm and cytoplasmic fatty change in almost all cases.
5) There was no recognizable specific correlation between the severity of pathological findings and the clinico-biochemical findings.
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