Medicine is one of the most common reasons young children end up in the emergency room. These six steps make your whole home, and your guests, part of the fix.
What to remember
- About 100 young children are brought to U.S. emergency rooms each day after getting into medicines left within reach.
- More than half the time children get into prescription pills, an adult had already removed them from child-resistant packaging.
- Keep all medicines, vitamins and supplements, including gummies, up and away in original child-resistant containers with the caps locked.
- Ask guests to store purses, bags and coats with medicine out of reach, and use hotel safes or high shelves when you travel.
- Use a drug take-back program first for leftovers; only FDA Flush List drugs should be flushed, and only when take-back is unavailable.
Every day in the United States, about 100 young children are brought to emergency rooms after getting into medicines left within reach. More than half the time a child gets into prescription pills, a CDC study found, an adult had already moved them out of their child-resistant container. The fix costs nothing and takes an afternoon. This walkthrough covers the whole house, your daily routine, your guests and your leftovers.
Step 1: Pick the Right Spots, Up and Away
Walk through your home with your child’s height in mind and choose spots that are too high for them to reach or see. A high cabinet or a top closet shelf works. What matters is that a child standing on a step stool, a chair or a toilet cannot get there.
The spots that cause trouble are the convenient ones. A bathroom cabinet at toddler height, a nightstand, a kitchen counter, or the bedside table where you set down a dose you will repeat in a few hours. The CDC’s Up and Away campaign is blunt: never leave medicine or supplements out on a counter or at a sick child’s bedside, even between doses.
Gummy vitamins and other supplements count as medicine here, and the same up-and-away rule applies to button batteries and other small household dangers.
Step 2: Use Original Containers and Child-Resistant Caps Correctly
Keep medicine in its original child-resistant container. If the bottle has a locking cap that turns, twist it until you cannot twist it any further or you hear the click. Recap it every time, because pills left out on a counter or table can look like candy to a young child, and liquid medicine can look like a sugary drink.
The original container is where many families slip. In the CDC study of poison center calls, more than half the time young children got into prescription pills, an adult had already taken them out of child-resistant packaging. What happened next varied by the type of medicine. ADHD medications and opioids were most often out in the open, not in any container at all, while diabetes and cardiac medications were more often transferred into pill organizers or baggies. Many organizers sold for daily use are not child-resistant at all, so check the label if you rely on one.
Safety alert: Child-resistant packaging buys time; it is not childproof. Store bottles out of reach and sight even when the cap is locked.
Pills dropped on the floor can roll out of sight, so sweep or vacuum before young children visit.
Step 3: Handle the Medicine You Use Every Day Differently
Everyday medicine deserves extra thought because routine is what makes it risky. You take a pill without thinking, set it down, and it stays within reach. In the CDC study, pills were often found sitting out on a countertop or bedside table for someone to take later.
Make the daily routine look like this:
- Give the dose at the kitchen counter or table, then return the bottle to its safe spot immediately.
- Carry medicine on the go in its original child-resistant container, never loose in a pocket or bag.
- Never tell a child medicine is candy, even to get a dose down. Teach them that only a grown-up gives medicine.
For liquid medicine, use the syringe or cup that came with the bottle. Liquid labels and dosing devices use milliliters to cut down on dosing errors, and a kitchen spoon does not.
Step 4: Deal With Guests, Grandma’s Purse and Suitcases
Guests bring medicine into your home without anyone noticing. A purse on the couch, a coat on a low hook, a suitcase on the guest bed: all of it sits at toddler height. For some prescription medicines that can harm young children in small amounts, such as diabetes and cardiac medications, more than half of the pills children got into belonged to grandparents, according to the CDC study.
When you host, ask guests to keep purses, bags and coats up and away and out of sight, and ask older relatives to sweep or vacuum before the kids arrive, since dropped pills roll under furniture.
When you travel, pack medicines in child-resistant containers and put them in a high cabinet or closet shelf once you arrive. In a hotel room, the in-room safe or a high closet shelf works. If you are the visitor, ask your hosts for a spot out of reach and sight.
Step 5: Get Rid of Leftover Medicine Safely
Clear out expired prescriptions and half-finished bottles on a schedule. The first choice for every unwanted household medicine is a drug take-back event or a mail-back envelope, so check with your pharmacy or local government for options near you.
If no take-back option is available, the next step depends on the FDA’s Flush List, a short list of ingredients, most of them opioids, that can be lethal in low doses. Medicine on that list can be flushed down the toilet when take-back is not an option. For everything else, mix the medicine with dirt, cat litter or used coffee grounds, seal it in a container, and put it in the household trash.
Check packaging or FDA guidance before flushing anything, and if a medicine in your cabinet has been recalled, follow what to do when a product you own is recalled.
Step 6: Program the Poison Control Number Now
Do this today, not during an emergency. Save the Poison Control hotline in your phone and post it on the refrigerator or next to the first-aid kit where every caregiver can find it. Grandparents and babysitters should have it too.
If a child in your home gets into medicine, Poison Control can talk you through what to do next. That is exactly why you should set this up while nothing is wrong, so you are not searching for a phone number with a toddler holding an open bottle.
Parents also ask
Are pill organizers safe to use with kids in the house?
Many are not child-resistant and can be opened easily by young children. If you use one, check that it is child-resistant and still keep it up and away, out of reach and sight.
Should I flush old medicine down the toilet?
Only medicine on the FDA’s Flush List, and only when a take-back program is not available. For everything else, use a take-back event or mix the medicine with dirt, cat litter or coffee grounds, seal it, and put it in the trash.
What counts as medicine for storage purposes?
Prescription drugs, over-the-counter medicines, vitamins and other supplements, including gummy vitamins. All of them should be stored up, away and out of sight of young children.
Where should medicine go when we travel?
Pack it in child-resistant containers, then use a high cabinet, a high closet shelf or the hotel room safe once you arrive.
This guide is general information for U.S. shoppers, not legal advice. Safety rules and store policies change, so follow the product’s instructions and labels and check official sources such as CPSC.gov, NHTSA.gov and FTC.gov.