Experts warn parents drugging kids for own respite

CNN quoted study-author, pediatrician and toxicology fellow, Dr. Shan Yin, of UC as saying, “We believe the malicious use of pharmaceuticals may be an under-recognized form and/or component of child maltreatment.”

1,439 pharmaceutical abuse cases studied
Researchers obtained data from National Poison Data System to study child abuse in the form of medications.

They studied cases that were reported between 2000 and 2008.

Reports of intended abuse of alcohol, painkillers, cough and cold medications, tranquilizers and sleeping pills, along with antipsychotic drugs were also included in the study.

Research outcomes

Analysis revealed that there were 160 cases of intended drug abuse including two deaths, in the years studied by researchers.

Furthermore, in 14 percent of the cases evaluated, there was average to extreme health fatalities in children owing to drug-abuse.

It was also known that children suffering drug-abuse were an average two years old.

The most common reported major pharmaceutical used were analgesics, stimulants, sedatives, anti psychotics along with cough and cold preparations and ethanol, found study.

Researchers also found that in 51 percent of the cases, children were exposed to at least one sedating agent.

There were 18 reported deaths, out of which 94 percent children were made to take sedating agents.

These included anti-histamines and opioids, which accounted for 8 cases each.

Stressing on the offensiveness of the act, Yin was quoted by Times Newsline as saying, “Even though the caregiver doesn’t intend to harm the child, it still falls under child abuse, and doctors need to be aware of this kind of issue, as they would be on alert for signs of physical or sexual abuse in a child.”

Study limitations
Noting limitations in the research, authors stated that poison reports could have been miscoded.

They added that any effort to estimate reasons behind medicating the children say, giving sedative to a crying baby, or a real attempt to hurt a child would be ‘purely speculative’.

However, analysis could have miscalculated the cases; the study is a ‘starting point for estimating the true incidence of this potentially under-recognized problem’, stated researchers.

The study appears online in the journal ‘Pediatrics’.