When parents childproof their house, especially from household poisons, they often concentrate on what they think are the top household poisons.
Unfortunately, they usually only consider those things that they think are most poisonous: prescription medications, alcohol, and hydrocarbons (gasoline, lamp oil, paint thinner, etc.). Surprisingly, while these may be some of the more deadly poisons, they are not even among the top ten household poisons to which children are exposed.
Instead, children's top household poisons include:
- cosmetics and personal care products
- household cleaning products
- pain relievers
- foreign bodies, toys, and other miscellaneous objects
- topical creams and ointments
- cold and cough medicines
- vitamins
- pesticides
- plants
- antihistamines
Childhood Poisonings
Although this list may be surprising to some people, especially those who are used to only thinking about pesticides and things like paint thinner as poisons, it is important to remember that almost anything that is misused and causes your child to have symptoms could be considered a poison exposure. So if your child gets too much actaminophen or ibuprophen (pain relievers), or an extra dose of a cold and cough medicine, then you should call poison control.
Since many of the things on the above list of household poisons are readily available in just about every house, and many parents don't consider them to be poisons, it is not surprising that they lead to so many poisonings.
That makes it important to get your home childproofed and lock up and secure all of these products as well as the more obvious poisons, such as pesticides, prescriptions medications, and hydrocarbons.
Sources:
2006 Annual Report of the American Association of Poison Control Centers' Nation Poison Data System (DPDS).
