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About the Oklahoma Poison Control Center

The Oklahoma Poison Control Center saves lives and saves money

The Oklahoma Poison Control Center operates 24 hours a day, 365 days per year. The poison center staffs specially trained licensed pharmacists and nurses who provide emergency poisoning management advice to Oklahoma residents and health care professionals. In 1999, eighty-one percent of poisoning cases were safely managed at   home, and therefore did not need to be treated in an expensive emergency room.

    

The Oklahoma Poison Control Center founded in 1960s

Mission:

The Oklahoma Poison Control Center exists to provide information concerning the prevention and management of potentially toxic exposures to the people of Oklahoma. The center's goal is to save lives as well as to provide a cost-effective service to patients and residents by promoting the appropriate use of health care resources.

 

The Oklahoma Poison Control Center was founded in the 1960s. At that time, a small corner in a laboratory of the State Health Department was the location of the center. The center answered about 500 poison calls in 1962. In 1972, the center operations moved to the Pediatric Division of Maternal and Child Health Services of the Oklahoma State Health Department. The center received almost 10,000 calls that year, largely from the Oklahoma City area. In 1978, the Oklahoma Poison Control Center operations transferred to Children's Memorial Hospital. At this time the scope of service increased to cover the entire state with the addition of a toll-free telephone service. Along with their other duties, the pharmacy staff at Children's Hospital provided 24-hour coverage. Today, the center answers over 50,000 phone calls a year.

Legal recognition of the Oklahoma Poison Control Center did not occur until July 1994 when Oklahoma Poison Control Act was approved by the state legislature. This act also legislatively mandated that The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy administer all operations of the Oklahoma Poison Control Center in cooperation with The Children's Hospital of Oklahoma.

Emergency poison calls are answered 24-hours a day by pharmacists and nurses intensively trained in clinical toxicology and designated as specialist in poison information. Each poison specialist has access to a variety of resources, including a computer database, that list many products and their ingredients.

The Oklahoma Poison Control Center is a certified poison center as independently evaluated by the American Association of Poison Control Centers (AAPCC).

 

A Standard of Excellence

The Oklahoma Poison Control Center is the recognized public health agency charged with the task of providing poison information services, as codified in the Oklahoma Statutes as Section 2654.1 of Title 63.The HIPAA Privacy Rules effective February 26, 2001 specifically makes provisions allowing a public health authority that is authorized by law to collect or receive patient information for the purposes of preventing injury (Section 164.512). Furthermore on page 82626 of these HIPAA Privacy Rules please note that poison control centers are health care providers for the purposes of this rule. Counseling and follow-up consultations provided by poison centers with individual providers regarding patient outcomes is considered to be treatment. Therefore poison control centers and other healthcare providers can share protected health information about the treatment of an individual without a business associate contract. As a Health Care Provider the poison control center is also required to comply with the Privacy Regulations.

Oklahoma Poison Control Center protocol requires telephone follow-up of all potentially toxic exposures with layperson's as well as health professionals. All regional poison control centers in the United States share this same protocol for the following reasons:

• Medical consultants are expected to follow their cases routinely. Poison Control Center Specialists are licensed pharmacists and registered nurses that are utilized by other health professionals as medical consultants in poisoning exposures.
• Data collection, as a clear function of each follow-up call, enables the Oklahoma Poison Control Center to evaluate their protocols, perform quality assurance studies, identify state trends and concerns, or gather toxicity data on new drugs and products.
• Outcome data obtained through telephone follow-up are utilized to facilitate the public health effort to prevent and better treat poisonings. Summary data from Oklahoma are reported to the Toxic Exposure Surveillance System operated by American Association of Poison Control Centers (AAPCC). AAPCC is the only national health organization that surveys the epidemiology of poisonings in the United States.
• All patient information is totally confidential. Data reported to the AAPCC 's Toxic Exposure Surveillance System excludes the identity of the patient and even their state of residence. The licensed healthcare professionals staffing the Oklahoma Poison Control Center maintain all patient records according to the statues and rules regulating medical records in the state of Oklahoma. Strict patient confidentiality is maintained.

Healthcare professionals are encouraged to help the Oklahoma Poison Control Center by cooperating with our Poison Specialists who will be calling for follow-up information.

Mailing Address

Oklahoma Poison Control Center
940 NE 13th Street, Rm 3N3510
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma 73104
Phone: (405) 271-5062
Fax: (405) 271-1816

If you need educational materials or know of individuals or groups that would benefit from poison prevention education, please email to oklahoma_poison@ouhsc.edu or call (405) 271-5062.

                                                                                  

 

The Oklahoma Poison Control Center web site is provided free of charge to the public as an informational and educational tool. This web site is NOT intended as a substitute for a consultation with the Oklahoma Poison Control Center. The center is a statewide program operated by The University of Oklahoma College of Pharmacy at the OU Medical Center. Our pharmacists and nurses are specially trained poison experts available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.