Through the contest, we hope to help minimize the number of accidental poisonings among young children. Typically, these calls involve incidents in the home in which a child's curiosity takes him or her into an unsecured storage area, where the child has access to simple, but toxic, household items, such as cosmetics, plants, cleaning agents, aspirin or cold pills. Childhood poisonings also frequently occur when a household product is not stored in its original container or is in use by an adult and is accessible to a child. The judging will take place March 4 at UC San Francisco. Winners will be announced the week of March 15 to 21, which is National Poison Prevention Week.
Families can obtain detailed contest rules and guidelines from local pharmacies.
More than 2,000 pharmacies across the state are participating in the contest. The toll-free hotline is operated 24 hours a day, with highly trained experts offering prompt advice over the phone for poisoning emergencies. In 1997, the system received some 322,000 calls regarding poisoning emergencies. Callers can obtain advice in more than 100 languages. Recent studies have shown that 78 percent of all accidental poisonings can be managed at home, avoiding the inconvenience and expense of a visit to a hospital emergency room.