Immediate and long-term outcome of corrosive ingestion

Corrosive ingestion (CI) has short- and long-term consequences. The aim of this study was to assess the outcome of mucosal injury grade ≥ 2A.

Consecutive patients between January 2008 and January 2015 who presented within 48 h of CI were included. Details of substance ingested, intent, symptoms, injury grade at endoscopy, and treatment were obtained by a review of medical records. Patients aged less than 15 years or injury grade less than 2A were excluded. Patients were followed up using a structured symptom-based questionnaire and barium swallow.

A total of 112 patients were admitted with CI during the study period. Eighty-two patients were included in the study. There was no relationship between the presence of symptoms or oral mucosal injury and the grades of gastrointestinal mucosal injury. Grades 2B and 3A were the most common grades of mucosal injury. Five patients died at index hospitalization. Patients were followed up for a median period of 31 months (6-72) during which 11 patients were lost to follow up. During follow up, 2 patients with high-grade injury died as a consequence of CI and 4 died of unrelated causes. Sixteen (26.6%) patients remained symptomatic. Forty-three patients underwent barium swallow. Esophageal stricture was identified in 11 patients, gastric stricture in 8, and combined esophageal and gastric in 2. High-grade esophageal mucosal injury was associated with a high risk of stricture formation (p = 0.02).

CI is associated with high immediate and long-term morbidity and mortality.