ABSTRACT
Nitrogen ◾ Uses: Fertilizer, cryosurgery (liquid N2), compressed gas for power tools ◾ Toxicity: Nitrogen narcosis (“rapture of the deep”); use helium in deep sea diving
operations > air with 80% N2 as the preferred diluent gas for O2 in deep sea diving operations and ascend slowly to prevent N2 bubble decompression and CNS-lung-GI air emboli, belly pain (“bends”), and osteonecrosis (caisson workers’ disease)
◾ Helium: Used in deep sea diving, asthmatics, and IABP because of its compressibility, inammability, low viscosity, and low lipid (tissue) solubility
◾ Methane: “Swamp gas” used as fuel for cooking, drying, driving autos, and generating electrical power
abused by adolescents-“hufng”
Table 29.1 Irritant Gases Stratified by Their Water Solubilities
◾ Outcomes of irritant gas poisoning: (1) acute lung injury (ALI = pulmonary edema), (2) subacute injury = bronchiolitis obliterans, and (3) chronic reactive airways dysfunction syndrome (RADS)
Kinder and gentler tear gases = capsaicin-pepper spray
Highly Soluble Irritants ◾ Ammonia (NH3) ◾ Chloramines ◾ Hydrogen chloride (HCl) ◾ Hydrogen uoride (HF) ◾ Sulfur dioxide (SO2) ◾ Acrolein ◾ “Tear gases”
Intermediate Solubility Irritants ◾ Chloride/chlorine (CL2) ◾ Methylisocyanate (MIC) (Bhopal) ◾ Immune sensitizers → occ asthma
◾ Zn and Cu: Most often, polymer-Teon®. ◾ Cadmium causes acute pneumonitis, not metal fume fever.
