Abstract
A 27-year-old female nurse intravenously injected 5 mL of cigarette soakage solution that contained approximately 5.7 mg nicotine, in a suicidal attempt. Clinical manifestations consisted of nausea, palpitation, abdominal pain, repeated vomiting, and diarrhea. She remained fully conscious during this episode. About 7 hours later, she visited emergency department on foot and received fluid infusion for dehydration. She fully recovered at night of the day. This is the first documented report of acute nicotine poisoning due to intravenous injection of cigarette soakage in humans. Signs and symptoms appeared immediately after the injection, but this case seemed to be relatively mild in terms of clinical manifestation. The elimination half-life of nicotine seems to be short, that is, less than 1 hour. Therefore, if initial treatment is appropriate and the patient can survive acute phase of nicotine poisoning, prognosis is good.