Prolonged Anticoagulation in Rat Poisoning

RODENTICIDES often contain warfarin or warfarinlike compounds as their active ingredient. The anticoagulant effects of human rodenticide poisoning do not, however, necessarily mimic those of a simple warfarin effect. This article reviews a case of human rodenticide poisoning with a very prolonged anticoagulant effect. The rodenticide's active ingredient is brodifacoum (marketed as Ratak[unk] in Canada and Talon[unk] in the United States), a recently developed coumarin anticoagulant that is effective against warfarin-resistant rats.¹This case shows that its anticoagulant effect in humans is similar to that seen in animal studies.² Report of a Case On Aug 10, 1983, a 17-year-old adolescent, weighing 65 kg, attempted suicide by ingesting approximately 7.5 mg (0.12 mg/ kg) of brodifacoum in a commercially available rodenticide. This was his first ingestion of a rodenticide and he denied taking any other toxic agents. Before this he had been in good physical health.