Almost a quarter of poisoned school children aged 13

13-year-olds are over-represented in school poisoning statistics, with industrial chemicals and medications among the most common causes. Photo / Steven McNicholl

Thirteen-year-olds are over-represented in school poisoning statistics, a study by a University of Otago student suggests.

Of all school and preschool students reported to the New Zealand National Poisons Centre between 1989 and 2009 nearly a quarter (24 per cent) were 13 years-old, undergraduate pharmacy student Benny Pan found.

The teenagers were mostly poisoned by ingesting industrial chemicals.

Medications were the next most common cause of poisoning, followed by household agents, including cleaning products.

Mr Pan chose to study schoolchildren because school was where young people spent a lot of their lives, he said.

A total of 3632 calls had been made to the centre during the two-decade period.

Otago School of Pharmacy senior lecturer Rhiannon Braund said people needed to take care in interpreting the statistics, as more study was required.

"While in this study there appears to be a statistical bubble at age 13, and some cause for concern, there is a lot more work still needed to further validate this work, and to find out why this may be the case."

Pre-schoolers still made up the largest group of poisoned children, she said.

- NZPA