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Parents need to be vigilant about how they store medicines

With more medicines and prescriptions to be found in American homes, the risk of accidental poisoning of young children just keeps getting higher.
Despite years of concerted prevention efforts such as improved safeguards on packaging and awareness campaigns for parents, more than half a million children are unintentionally exposed to pharmaceuticals each year.

“The problem of pediatric poisoning in the U.S. is getting worse, not better,” says Dr. Randall Bond of Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, which reviewed more than 544,000 child poisonings of children 5 and under. Overall, there was a disproportionate increase of 22 percent in the exposure for this age group, while the number of children in the U.S. under the age of 5 years grew by only 8 percent during the study period.

In an attempt to focus continued poison prevention, the authors organized the data according to drug type and whether the exposure was caused by the child self-ingesting the medication or by a dosing error. The study found that 95 percent of emergency room visits resulted from self-ingestion.

The authors attribute this increase to a greater availability of, and access to, medications in the child’s home. They also note that effective “poison proofing” may have reached a plateau or declined in recent years. “Prevention efforts of parents and caregivers to store medicines in locked cabinets or up and away from children continue to be crucial,” Dr. Bond says. However, there could also be a great potential benefit in packaging design changes that reduce the quantity a child could quickly and easily access in a self-ingestion episode, like flow restrictors on liquids and one-at-a-time tablet dispensing containers, he says.

Meanwhile, the American Academy of Pediatrics suggests parents take the following prevention steps:
• Keep all medicines in a latched or locked cabinet that is inaccessible to even the most resourceful children.
• Do not take medicine in front of small children. Children tend to copy adult behavior.
• Call medicine by its correct name. You do not want to confuse the child by calling medicine candy.
• Always replace the medicine container’s safety caps immediately after use.
• Check your home often for old medications and get rid of them by flushing them down the toilet.
• Be aware that there is more of a danger of poisoning when you are away from home, especially at a grandparent’s home where medicines may be within easy reach.