[The activities of a pediatric emergency department. The emergency problems]. / L'attività di un pronto soccorso pediatrico. Problemi emergenti.

The authors reviewed records of admission at the Fist Ais-Emergency Service of "G. Gaslini" Children's Hospital, data referring both to in and outpatients. First of all we took into account epidemiological data analysing occurrence and types of diseases; at the same time a demographic study, which aimed to show a decrease in the child population in Genova, was performed. Secondly we compared these data with the real number of admitted patients: collected data showed that this service has been used excessively.

[Cerebral gigantism or Sotos' syndrome]. / Gigantismo cerebrale o sindrome di Sotos.

The paper describes a case of Sotos syndrome and reviews the world literature on the subject. Inheritance may be dominant autosomal as well as recessive, although the latter is quite rare. The pathophysiology is not well known but a common underlying basis between various syndromes (Sotos; Beckwith-Wiedemann; Klippel-Trenaunay) is hypothesised.

Epidemiological aspects of poisoning in children observed over a 10-year period.

During 10 years of activity at our Service, we collected 1867 cases of poisoning in children. Our observations concern only subjects hospitalized at our Institute and do not include phone call consultations. Our experience confirmed a higher number of poisonings among males. As far as age was concerned, the highest percentage of cases involved children under five, with a peak between 2 and 3 years of age. A fairly high incidence (8%) of "passive" poisonings was found in infants in their first year of life as a consequence of mistakes by the mother or other people taking care of the child. Voluntary poisonings, occurring in children aged 9 or more, often involved females and accounted for 2.1% of the total. Drugs are the main cause of poisoning in children, followed by household products and by a group of different substances (spoiled foods, nonedible mushrooms, alcoholic beverages). The lowest number of poisonings occurred on Sundays. The time of the day when most accidental poisonings occurred ranged from 10:00 AM to 12:00 noon and from 6:00 to 8:00 PM. Most poisonings took place in the kitchen. The colors preferred by children are white and pink.