What is vitamin A poisoning

Although vitamin A is an essential nutrient for our body, if it is consumed in excess for some reason, it may cause symptoms of poisoning. Generally speaking, if a child takes more than 300,000 units of vitamin A, it is very easy to cause chronic poisoning. Of course, everyone's body has a different tolerance to vitamin A, so the poisoning dose also varies to a certain extent.

Acute vitamin A poisoning usually occurs 3 to 6 hours after consumption. The main manifestations are: digestive system symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, poor appetite, thirst, abdominal pain, diarrhea, and enlarged and tender liver. Neurological symptoms include headache, dizziness, vomiting, fatigue, drowsiness, mental retardation, etc. Infants often have bulging anterior fontanelle, irritability and mild symptoms of meningeal irritation (mainly due to excessive vitamin A, which activates the secretion of the ventricular membrane and increases cerebrospinal fluid, leading to increased intracranial pressure).

Eye symptoms include conjunctival injection, subconjunctival hemorrhage, blurred vision, diplopia, and sometimes papilledema. Skin symptoms: The skin is flushed. 1 to 3 days after poisoning, there may be varying degrees of peeling, extending from the area around the mouth and between the nose and lips to the entire body. The peeling is scaly to large flaky, with pigmentation, and loss of hair and sweat hair. The skin is often scratched due to extreme itching. There is a history of taking large amounts of vitamin A or eating large amounts of animal liver. Symptomatic supportive treatment includes intravenous drip of 10% glucose solution or glucose saline; application of vitamin B and vitamin C; reduction of intracranial pressure; use of sedatives and analgesics; anti-allergic treatment, etc.

Some people are medical patients suffering from vitamin A poisoning, and this group of people must be extremely careful. For example, some people suffer from retinal diseases. At this time, doctors recommend supplementing vitamin A. However, when taking vitamin A, you must take it reasonably according to the drug instructions or the doctor's advice, otherwise overdose can easily lead to poisoning.