Characteristics of Ent Foreign Bodies in a Hospital at Cotonou, Benin

Introduction: Foreign bodies (FB) can constitute a life-threatening emergency by their nature or their location. The objective of this study was to describe the socio-demographic, diagnostic and therapeutic characteristics of FB in the ENT department of CHUZ-Suru Léré in Cotonou. Methods: This was a descriptive and analytical cross-sectional study, with retrospective data collection spanning a period of ten (10) years from January 1st, 2013 to December 31st, 2022. Patients of all ages seen in consultations in the ENT and CCF department of the CHUZ-Suru Léré during the study period and meeting the inclusion criteria were taken into account. Results: During the study period, 1810 cases of FB were collected among the 13,947 consultations, i.e. a hospital frequency of 12.98%. The age of the patients varied from 19 days to 94 years with a predominance of children under 10 years (60.2%). The sex ratio (male/female) was 1.13. The duration between the onset of FB and the medical consultation was greater than 72 hours in 88.49% of cases. The circumstances of occurrence of FB were unknown in 86.34% of cases. The external acoustic meatus was the most common location (90.22%). The nature of FB was inorganic in 86.80% of cases dominated by earwax plugs (77.90%), and organic FB in 7.96% of cases dominated by cotton (3.98%). All FB were extracted by the route of introduction except one case. The extraction was performed most often in the consultation chair (97.07% of cases). The evolution was generally favorable (99.94%). Conclusion: ENT foreign bodies are a frequent reason for consultation and mainly affect male children. They are usually inorganic. Evolution is generally favorable after extraction. Prevention remains the best solution.

Fractional Crystallization and Crustal Contamination of Doleritic and Trachytic Dykes Crosscutting the Cretaceous Sedimentary Basins from Figuil (North Cameroon) and Léré(South-Western Chad): Geodynamic Implications

Magmatism in the Cretaceous sedimentary basins of the Figuil and Léré regions constitutes one of the fundamental parameters in the reconstruction of the history of the Cretaceous sedimentary basins. The main objective of this paper is to constrain the petrogenetic processes of hypovolcanic rocks and to determine their geodynamic context of emplacement. The petrographic study of mafic hypovolcanic and trachytic rocks was carried out under a polarizing microscope on thin sections. For the geochemical study, the major oxides and some trace elements were analyzed by ICP-AES. Trace and rare earth elements were analyzed by ICP-MS. The dolerites of the Cretaceous sedimentary basins are composed of dykes of amphibole bearing dolerites, biotite and pyroxene bearing dolerite, pyroxene bearing dolerites and trachytes. The dykes are in the order of 20 to 100 m wide by several kilometers long and oriented from N23°E to N90°E. The textures of these rocks are sub-ophitic to intergranular for dolerites and trachytic for evolved rocks (trachytes). The geochemical study shows that the dolerites are basaltic in composition with alkaline to subalkaline character. The sampled dykes have an evolution dominated by fractional with the minor impact of the crustal assimilation characterized by low Rb/Y ratios for dolerites (0.36 - 0.97) and high values of Rb/Y for the Pan-African granitoids’ samples (1.95 - 4.01). The nature of doleritic and trachytic magma sources is supported by their (Tb/Yb)N > 1.9 (1.91 - 3.79) and Dy/Yb > 2 (2.32 - 3.50) ratios of most samples, which suggests melting in a garnet-bearing mantle. Concerning the geodynamic context of the studied rocks, doleritic samples are classified as within-plate tholeiite and volcanic arc basalt, and within-plate alkali basalts.