Trends from a poison control center

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Along with its hit series Toxin Tails, the Pet Poison Helpline will share the top 10 calls they receive for consultation each year. The team hopes that by sharing this data it can help veterinary professionals be prepared for toxic cases within their clinics and how to help. Although there are common toxins that are on everyone's radar, such as chocolate, ever wonder if any new toxin is out there that veterinary professionals should be educating clients on?

In a sneak peek of her upcoming lecture, "A year in review: Toxin Trends from a Poison Control Center", that she will be presenting at this year's Fetch Kansas City Conference, Renee Schmid, DVM, DABT, DABVT, senior veterinary toxicologist and director of veterinary medicine at Pet Poison Helpline, shared some trends that have made their way onto the Top 10 Toxins list at Pet Poison Helpline, including a veterinary drug becoming the first to break the top 10.

Below is a partial transcript

Renee Schmid, DVM, DABT, DABVT: It shouldn't be surprising, but interesting to see marijuana and THC. That's something that has continued to creep up the list. It's up to number 6 back in 2023, so this past year, we always kind of look at the year before, and so it's continuing to increase in numbers, as far as the number of calls that we received from that.

The other thing that I found that was interesting and looking at the trends is when we looked at different ages with animals, dogs and cats, and what they're most commonly getting into, and as the pet population ages, we start to see a higher increase in number of things that they get into that are more common in older animals too.