Poison Information Centre relaunched after major upgrade

The Poison Information Centre was on Tuesday relaunched after a major facelift.

The centre which began operations in 2005 is housed at Kenyatta National Hospital and is a collaboration between Aak-GROW and Kenyatta National Hospital.

The PIC has been at the forefront of providing immediate and expert medical advice to individuals exposed to the risks of potentially hazardous substances.

These include household detergents, industrial chemicals, pharmaceutical products, pesticides, drug substances and poisons of animal and food origin.

According to the aak-GROW chairperson Patrick Amuyunzu, farmers are guided on the information they need in regards to handling poisonous pesticides.

The centre has a call agent who receives the initial phone calls to the toll-free line and forwards poison cases to the medical staff.

"The call agent eliminates the probability of non-poison cases being forwarded to medical staff at KNH therefore making optimum use of their time and knowledge," he said.

"The call agent further is trained to advise callers for non-poison related calls and aak-GROW seeks to enhance this function, especially in areas where we have high-risk value chains with significant pesticide use," he added.

Through its toll-free hotlines - 0800-720021 and 0800-730030 the centre offers round-the-clock support for cases requiring urgent medical attention.

The centre’s capabilities has been expanded and upgraded, including improved data collection, efficient call routing to medical experts, access to remote medical facilities, and the handling of inquiries beyond pesticide poisoning.

The centre has been digitised to enable real-time data capture for quicker analysis and hence informed decision-making on poison cases and future responsible use interventions.

It has also reduced transcription errors and the data is more sharable since various stakeholders were involved in the development of the tool.