Help Your Kids Stay Safe This Summer — Keep All Medicines Up and Away
Published June 21, 2023 (revised June 24, 2024)
Kids can get sick if they swallow medicines, vitamins, or other supplements they’re not supposed to – including those that come in gummy form. Help your kids stay healthy this summer by keeping your medicines in a safe place — whether you’re at home or on the go.
Consider these tips to store medicines safely:
With hectic summer schedules, it’s easy to forget about everyday tasks. Don’t forget to put medicines, vitamins, and other supplements away right after you give or take them, every time.
Keep medicines in a place kids can’t see or reach — like in a high cabinet or on a high closet shelf.
Planning a family vacation? Be sure to pack your medicines in child-resistant containers. If you’re staying in a hotel, you can put medicines in the hotel room safe or on a high shelf in the closet.
Be sure to keep your vitamins and other supplements —including those in gummy form —up and away and out of sight and reach too!
If you think your child may have swallowed a medicine, vitamin, or other supplement, get help right away — even if you’re not sure. Call Poison Help at 800-222-1222 or go to PoisonHelp.org.
More Safety Articles
Prescription Drug Abuse… in Older Adults?
Drug abuse affects people from all walks of life. But when you hear about drug abuse, you tend to think of teens or young adults, not older adults. Unfortunately, drug abuse in older adults is also a serious problem. It occurs most often when the elderly misuse or abuse their own prescription medicines or when they intentionally take medicines prescribed for other people.
Don’t Mistake an EpiPen Training Pen for the Real Thing
If you keep an EpiPen (epinephrine) on hand to treat a severe allergic reaction, you need to know about a potentially dangerous mix-up between the actual EpiPen pen and a similar-looking training pen.
A man was awakened by a toothache in the middle of the night. Without turning on the lights, he pulled out and applied what he thought was a spray of pain reliever for his toothache. Afterwards, he did not rinse his mouth. In the daylight of the morning, he realized he had actually used Lamisil AT Pump Spray in his mouth.
Possible Risk of Injury Following EpiPen Jr Injection
If you keep an EpiPen Jr (epinephrine) auto-injector on hand in case a child has a severe allergic reaction, you need to know about the risk of cutting a child while the needle is under the skin if he or she moves during the injection. An EpiPen Jr auto-injector is a disposable automatic injection device filled with 1 dose of epinephrine. When the orange tip is pressed against a child's outer thigh until it "clicks" and then held there for 10 seconds, the dose is automatically delivered. Prompt treatment of severe allergic reactions in the home and community can be lifesaving and has resulted in better survival rates and less long-term effects. Most often, auto-injectors are used successfully without complications. But two children recently sustained cuts on their legs when using the EpiPen Jr.
.png)