By Samantha Bartlett

Using five years of call data, toxicologists at the Pet Poison Helpline developed an interactive tool to help pet owners find toxins in their area. The release was timed to coincide with Pet Poison Prevention month in March. The dashboard, Toxin Trends, shows the 20 deadliest toxins in each state along with the most common symptoms for each toxicity. Toxin Trends was released last year with the most common toxic plants in each state. The list this year includes medications, chemicals, plants, foods and other items. The most commonly reported toxin across the country is chocolate. Rankings below that are more likely to reflect regional influence. 

The tool is free and user-friendly. Users can select between species including dog, cat, bird, exotic and equine, or view trends across all species. The previous version focused on plants is also still available to select. Toxicologists hope that it will help pet owners avoid prevalent toxins in their area and perhaps help research precautions to take when traveling to different regions. The Pet Poison Helpline plans to release future versions of Toxin Trends to share more of their data accumulated over the years. 

The Toxin Trends dashboard can be accessed at https://www.petpoisonhelpline.com/toxin-trends/.