Be careful when going through your yard if you are looking for something to eat, or you might end up in the hospital.
A Michigan man was hospitalized last week after ingesting the roots of a pokeweed plant. After the plant was identified by MSU’s Peter Carrington, the man was treated and now is expected to make a full recovery.
“The man misidentified the plant and thought it was a dandelion,” said Carrington, assistant instructor of plant biology and assistant curator of the W.J. Beal Botanical Garden. “Fortunately, we were able to identify the plant.”
Following a call from the Children’s Hospital of Michigan Regional Poison Control Center in Detroit, MSU’s Frank Telewski asked Carrington to help him identify the plant.
“The man’s wife apparently had the presence of mind to take a few photos of the plant,” Carrington said. “From that, I was able to identify the plant as pokeweed.”
Carrington pointed out the man consumed the roots, described as a “white carrot.” The roots also happen to be the most toxic part of the plant.
Dandelions are very common plants and are known to be edible; however, pokeweed is not confused often with dandelions, said Carrington.
MSU’s plant toxicology expertise is known to the Poison Control Center because MSU facilitates a toxicology workshop for medical residents twice a year, going over the types of poisonous plants people might eat as well as the medicinal properties of other plants.
“We have an excellent collection of poison plants here,” Carrington said. “Our seven categories of poison plants serve as a great teaching tool.”
The Poison Control Center in Detroit serves nearly 8 million people across the state and fields about 85,000 calls per year. However, plants only cracked the top 20 for calls to poison control centers across the country in 2011, said the medical director of Children’s Hospital of Michigan Regional Poison Control Center, Dr. Cynthia Aaron.
“We receive a few pokeweed calls,” Aaron said. “Mostly, they are because of kids who get into plants around the house.”
Melissa Chamberlain, an elementary education junior, indicated that she feels more comfortable knowing the faculty at her university can identify poisonous plants.
“I wouldn’t eat anything unless someone I trusted told me it was safe,” Chamberlain said. “But I feel honored to go to a college where the professors clearly make a difference in the world.”
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