Alerts

Keep Up-to-Date on the Latest Poison News

The AAPCC works with America's 55 poison centers to track poisonings and their sources, including household products, food and beverages, chemicals in the workplace and home, environmental toxins, drugs and medicine, and animal and insect bites and stings.

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  • National Poison Prevention Week is March 20-26!

    Be a part of the conversation by following #nppw16 and #preventpoison on social media, and check out AAPCC's NPPW webpage and press releases!

    NPPW 2016

  • Become a Sustaining Member of AAPCC!

    Your organization’s annual unrestricted gift helps ensure that AAPCC can continue to provide vital support to our country’s 55 poison center members.

    Click here!

  • Save the Poison Help Number in Your Phone!

    Scan the QR code below to automatically store the Poison Help number in your phone! Works on any smart phone platform (must download a free barcode/QR scanner app).

    QR Code!

  • Poison Control Today

    Subscribe to "Poison Control Today: A Quarterly Bulletin of the American Association of Poison Control Centers," and stay up-to-date on the latest poison safety and prevention news!

    Sign Up!

  • Save the Date! Medication Safety 101 Twitter Chat

    Medication Safety 101: Usage, Storage & Disposal Twitter Chat, March 23, 2016, 1-2 PM ET You can follow the chat @aging_research and use ‪#‎SafeMedsChat‬

    Get More Info!

  • Safe Kids Worldwide 2015 Annual Medication Safety

    Safe Kids Worldwide releases their 2015 research report, Medicine Safety for Children: An In-Depth Look at Calls to Poison Centers.

    Go to report!

  • OTC Medicine Safety Program

    Research shows that kids begin to self-administer medicine at around 11-years-old. AAPCC and its partners are continuing their commitment to help educate “tweens” on the safe use of over-the-counter (OTC) medicines with their expanded, free OTC Medicine Safety classroom program.

    Learn more

  • Map of America's Poison Centers

    America's 55 poison centers serve every region of the country. This map shows where your local poison center is located.

    Click Here

  • Partners

    The AAPCC partners with many other organizations to address poisoning issues. Click here to learn more

    Click Here

  • Meet Your Poison Center Experts!

    When you call the Poison Help line, a poison expert is on the other end of line to help you. Click below to view the AAPCC Poison Center Spotlight!

    Click Here

  • Poison Centers Save the U.S. $1.8 Billion Per Year

    For every dollar invested in the poison center system, $13.39 are saved in medical costs and lost productivity, for a total savings of more than $1.8 billion every year.

    See the Report

Prevention

In 2013, America’s 55 poison centers received over 3.1 million calls. Of those, about 2.2 million were calls about poison exposures ranging from carbon monoxide to snake bites to food poisoning. The rest were calls for information.

These prevention tips can help you or your loved ones avoid poisonings. For more tips and information, call your local poison center at 1-800-222-1222.

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  • Food & Mushroom Poisoning

    The CDC estimates that food poisoning affects 1 in 6 Americans every year. Read on for information about how to protect against food-borne illness.

    Read more ›

  • In the Home

    Follow these steps to make sure your home is poison-proof.

    Read more ›

  • National Poison Prevention Week

    Congress established National Poison Prevention Week (NPPW) on Sept. 16, 1961 (P.L. 87-319) to highlight the dangers of poisonings and how to prevent them. Sponsored by the National Poisoning Prevention Council, NPPW is the third week in March each year.

    Read more ›

  • Over-the-Counter Medicine Safety

    Over-the-Counter Medicine Safety is a 100% free, evidence-based set of resources designed to empower adults to facilitate critical medicine safety discussions with pre-adolescents and adolescents.

    Read more ›

  • Partners

    The AAPCC partners with many organizations to enhance nationwide poison prevention and treatment efforts.

    Read more ›

National Poison Data System


AAPCC owns and manages the National Poison Data System (NPDS), a database collating years of information and poisoning exposure calls placed to AAPCC member poison centers across the country. The categorization of these calls into: human or animal poison exposure calls (an actual or suspected exposure occurred where the caller seeks information regarding triage and treatment) and information calls (no exposure occurred; the caller just seeks information regarding a specific substance) allows for the granularity necessary to evaluate and analyze toxic exposure patterns. NPDS is the only near real-time comprehensive poisoning surveillance database in the United States.

AAPCC publishes a comprehensive report of NPDS call data annually, approximately one year after the close of the data year in the journal Clinical Toxicology and is available for download free-of-charge by clicking “Current Annual Report” below. 

To learn more about NPDS click the “Request Data” link below.

Request Data Current Annual Report past reports

Our Work

The AAPCC's mission is to actively advance the health care role and public health mission of our members through information, advocacy, education and research. 

The AAPCC is located at 515 King St., Suite 510, Alexandria, VA 22314. 

Phone: 703-894-1858

Email: info@aapcc.org

About AAPCC ›Working with the AAPCC ›

Press Releases

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Find Your Local Poison Center

Poison centers offer free, private, confidential medical advice 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. You can reach your local poison center by calling 1-800-222-1222.

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