A comparison of the frequency and severity of poisoning cases for ingestion of acetaminophen, aspirin, and ibuprofen.

During 1984, 62,837 cases of human exposure to analgesics were reported to the National Data Collection System of the American Association of Poison Control Centers. We undertook a comparative study of 10,134 cases of human exposure to adult formulations of aspirin, acetaminophen, and ibuprofen from which we found that human exposures to analgesics are a common problem reported to poison control centers. All three analgesics studied appear to have minimal toxicity in children who accidentally ingest the product and report the exposure to a poison control center. Most children were managed without referral to a health care facility and without specific therapeutic intervention, other than palliative measures; only a few children develop symptoms from the exposure. When symptoms developed, most were not life-threatening and the child returned to a preexposure state of health within a short time after the onset of symptoms. In adults, the analgesics appear to be relatively safe--that is, most cases had either no effect or caused only minor symptoms; less than 5% of the patients developed a major effect and less than 0.5% died as a result of their exposure. Because the majority of adults took the analgesic intentionally, the low rate of serious effect is notable. Fewer adult patients who ingested ibuprofen were hospitalized or experienced a major effect as a result of their exposure than patients ingesting aspirin or acetaminophen. No deaths were reported in the ibuprofen group.