If you are a parent of young children you probably cheered on your little one when he first stood up on his own and took that first step. Your baby, now officially a toddler, is on the way to many adventures. Let’s hope that one of them isn’t exploring your medicine cabinet, your household cleaning supplies, or peeking under the bathroom rug to find that pill you dropped and forgot about. Most parents are likely to have installed cabinet locks of some sort to try to prevent their children from getting to medications or cleaning fluids, but accidents happen. According to PoisonPrevention.org, over 2 million poisonings are reported across the country, the majority of them to children under the age of six. Just having cabinet locks, child proof tops on your prescription and aspirin bottles, and moving poisonous substances to a higher shelf isn’t always enough. 
Children at this age are inquisitive and will try to get to something that looks or smells interesting.
PoisonPrevention.org has named the third week in March every year Poison Prevention Week to bring awareness to poisonings in the home. One of the mottos of their campaign is “Children Act Fast…So Do Poisons!” Although most poisoning victims are children, adults can be poisoned, too. Not reading the label and looking at your medication every time, taking your medication in the dark or mixing medications with alcohol can be deadly.
If you suspect that you or your child has taken the wrong medication, too much of it, or in the child’s case ingested anything that they weren’t supposed to, the first step is to call the National Poison Hotline at 1-800-222-1222. This new national toll-free number is available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week and will connect you with one of the 64 regional poison control centers that are prepared to answer questions on actions to be taken if a poison has been ingested. Not all chemicals or medications are poisonous or will cause an immediate reaction but these centers can tell you what is poisonous and what to do.
Some chemicals, medications, or minerals take a long time to cause a reaction or a problem. One of the most well-known of these is lead. Children are frequently exposed to lead without a parent realizing it. Many parents know that lead paint is dangerous and exposure can cause serious problems for children, but lead may also be present in the paint on antique toys, toys made overseas or in old, painted metal play equipment. Over time, exposure to lead can interfere with development of the nervous system, causing potentially permanent learning and behavior disorders in children. Symptoms may include abdominal pain, confusion, headache, and anemia and in severe cases seizures, coma and death. There is no safe level of lead exposure! Blood tests, such as those offered by ANY LAB TEST NOW® can determine if you or your child has been exposed to heavy metals, including lead. Contact your nearest ANY LAB TEST NOW® location to find out more about the right test to answer your questions and concerns.
We all intend to be good parents and to protect our children, but forgetting to put your medication away one time might be enough for your toddler to get to the bottle. Poison Prevention Week is an excellent time to check your house for missing locks, hazardous substances not put away and to review where you keep things and the steps you take to protect your child. It’s worth taking a little extra time to prevent a tragic poisoning. Don’t you agree?
Written by www.anylabtestblog.com
