Deng SK, Wang Q, Duan SJ, Yu SH. Ethylene glycol poisoning: A case report and review of the literature. World J Clin Cases 2025; 13(20): 103842 [DOI: 10.12998/wjcc.v13.i20.103842]
Corresponding Author of This Article
Sheng-Hui Yu, Chief Physician, Department of Emergency, Chengdu First People's Hospital/Chengdu Integrated TCM and Western Medicine Hospital, No. 18 Wangxiang Road, Gaoxin District, Chengdu 610000, Sichuan Province, China. yushenghui886@163.com
Research Domain of This Article
Critical Care Medicine
Article-Type of This Article
Case Report
Open-Access Policy of This Article
This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Shi-Kun Deng, Qing Wang, Shi-Jie Duan, Department of Intensive Care Unit, Chengdu First People's Hospital/Chengdu Integrated TCM and Western Medicine Hospital, Chengdu 610000, Sichuan Province, China
Sheng-Hui Yu, Department of Emergency, Chengdu First People's Hospital/Chengdu Integrated TCM and Western Medicine Hospital, Chengdu 610000, Sichuan Province, China
Co-first authors: Shi-Kun Deng and Qing Wang.
Author contributions: Deng SK and Wang Q performed the research, drafted the manuscript, searched the database, edited the manuscript, and performed the final review; Duan SJ received consent from the patient, digitized the figures, drafted and edited the manuscript; Yu SH wrote the manuscript, summarized the literature, generated the tables and edited the manuscript. All the authors read and approved the final manuscript.
Informed consent statement: Written informed consent to publish this information was obtained from the study participants.
Conflict-of-interest statement: The authors have no conflicts of interest to disclose.
CARE Checklist (2016) statement: The authors have read the CARE Checklist (2016), and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the CARE Checklist (2016).
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Sheng-Hui Yu, Chief Physician, Department of Emergency, Chengdu First People's Hospital/Chengdu Integrated TCM and Western Medicine Hospital, No. 18 Wangxiang Road, Gaoxin District, Chengdu 610000, Sichuan Province, China. yushenghui886@163.com
Received: December 16, 2024 Revised: February 20, 2025 Accepted: March 8, 2025 Published online: July 16, 2025 Processing time: 116 Days and 6.1 Hours
Abstract
BACKGROUND
Ethylene glycol (EG) poisoning is often caused by the accidental ingestion of antifreeze. EG is metabolized into glycolate and oxalate and may cause metabolic acidaemia, neurotoxicity, acute kidney injury, and death. A variety of EG poisoning case reports have been published, and we wrote this case report and literature review to summarize the clinical experience of patients who survived EG poisoning.
CASE SUMMARY
In this case report, a 55-year-old man developed EG poisoning after ingesting antifreeze by accident and experienced acute kidney injury, nervous system dysfunction and inhalation pneumonia. The timely use of ethanol for detoxification, initiation of haemodialysis, and protection of organ function are effective treatment methods for patients with antifreeze poisoning. The patient was discharged in the 3rd week after admission. When discharged, the patient did not report any discomfort, had stable vital signs, did not have fever or diarrhoea, and had improved liver and kidney functions.
CONCLUSION
A timely diagnosis, haemodialysis, and organ protection are the keys to the successful treatment of poisoned patients.
Core Tip: Ethylene glycol (EG) poisoning causes harmful clinical outcomes. Although published EG poisoning case reports are not rare, summative literature reviews are lacking. We shared a case about how we rescued an EG poisoning patient and summarized the case reports of EG poisoning from the PubMed database in the decade. We found out the rough hospital stay time for EG poisoning patients and the potential quick test to determine EG poisoning. This article aims to provide a more systematic clinical strategy for diagnosing and treating EG patients.
