Poison Control: Cough syrup

We called Poison Control last night after Milo (16 months) opened a bottle of children's cold medicine, the kind with pseudephedrine and dextromethorphan. He had spilled some of it, so we weren't sure how much he'd swallowed, even though it was a new bottle. Mark poured the remains into a measuring cup marked in ounces (note to self: obtain 150-ml graduated cylinder for household use) and estimated he'd had somewhere between three and eight doses. The operator asked me a few questions, put me on hold briefly to get the information, and returned: feed him a snack, give him four to six ounces of milk to dilute, expect jitteriness and dizziness, call back if we have questions.

This is the third time we've called the poison control number. The first time, Milo had eaten maybe an ounce of bar soap; I hadn't ever considered soap as a hazardous substance, but he refused to nurse and cried and cried in pain from it while I searched for the phone number. (Give him milk, the operator said. He won't breastfeed, and he won't drink either! Give him ice cream, then. He slurped it right down and was instantly better.) The second time, the two-year-old daughter of a friend had bitten into a tube of rubber cement and it squirted into her mouth. I wasn't in the room for all of this story, so I don't remember what else the operators told our friend to do, but I remember they said it would make her sleepy, and to let her sleep but keep an eye on her. It did, and she did. After that, I wrote the number down inside a family health reference book. The national toll-free number is 1-800-222-1222.

Helpful folks, the poison control staffers. Nobody should ever hesitate to call them; if it's nothing to be worried about, they'll tell you so and you'll feel better, and they can also help you help your child feel better. I know that giving milk or water helps in some poisonings or irritations, but I would never have thought of ice cream as the ideal substance to keep around just in case a child refuses milk or water. It makes perfect sense, but I never thought of it.

The webpage of the American Association of Poison Control Centers has some interesting and useful information. Top of the list: Find Your Poison Control Center by zipcode. There's also data on the training of the staff (they are mostly nurses and pharmacists) and many informational links.

I scanned through tables of pediatric (children under six) exposures to pharmaceutical and non-pharmaceutical substances. The data appears to have been compiled from calls to poison control centers. Among pharmaceutical products, the most frequently reported exposures (more than 10,000 in that year) include children's acetominophen, children's ibuprofen, antihistamines, antibiotics, antacids, "topical diaper products," and kids' multivitamins. To me this suggests the following general rule: If you keep stuff in your house and use it often, your small children will try to eat it.

Among the non-pharmaceutical substances, "pens and ink" stood out to me, because (a) a large number of people called Poison Control when their kids apparently bit into a pen and (b) my kids have bitten into countless pens, but I never once thought about "ink poisoning." I also noticed that, while cleaning supplies in general accounted for a very large number of calls, common bleach seemed to be the most frequently called-about cleaner. That seemed a bit odd---why would children tend to drink bleach more than, say, window cleaner or dish soap? Then it occurred to me that bleach is one of those substances that Everyone Knows Is Poisonous. Perhaps more people call Poison Control when their child seems to have swallowed bleach than they would if it were window cleaner. Or perhaps the warnings on the side of the bottle are more vigorous. My suspicions were strengthened when I saw the very large number of calls about "desiccants"---I can only assume we are talking about those little packets, found inside new shoes and purses, that are marked in bold capital letters "DO NOT EAT."