Poison Control Center (PCC) Data

Last Updated: March 2022

Each state’s Poison Control Center (PCC) will have several toxicologists with specialized information about specific drugs. To assist in responding to an alert, PCC staff may create fact sheets or other educational materials about a given substance that can be distributed to partners in an email or through a large-scale alert such as a HAN (Health Alert Network).

There are currently 55 PCCs that cover the entire U.S. and its territories. Some states have more than one PCC and some PCCs cover more than one state. State health department and PCC collaboration regarding the use of PCC data for state-based public health surveillance activities is variable. CDC works with AAPCC to use PCC data via NPDS at the national level for various public health surveillance activities, although the data is not owned by CDC. 

NPDS monitors calls to PCCs and is especially helpful in detecting overdose outbreaks where patients are experiencing atypical symptoms and/or an atypical drug is involved. Recently, poison control center data was used to characterize Tianeptine exposures.  

A recent report suggests that PCC data may be useful for predicting national trends in prescription opioid deaths. Also, some evidence suggests PCCs can detect increases in heroin deaths. However, the data does not seem to predict national trends in synthetic opioid deaths excluding methadone, such as fentanyl, especially illicitly-manufactured fentanyl. 

Some jurisdictions may mandate and encourage reporting of overdoses requiring medical care. Data in these jurisdictions could be especially useful. 

The Oregon ESSENCE team has developed a Guide for other states to use to set up a web service link to their PCC and extract its data into ESSENCE. It contains advice based on Oregon’s experience in developing its link with its PCC and NDPS, along with programming files, instructions, and a data dictionary provided by NPDS.  Read More: Integrating Poison Center Data into Oregon ESSENCE using a Low-Cost Solution.