What’s in a Name: Quite a lot really. Choosing the wrong name for a product can be disastrous in terms of patient safety. Look-a-like and sound-a-like names are all too common, and continue to produced. Combined with poor handwriting the dangers are multiplied. A recent review in Drug Safety is worth a [...]
WHIMSical thoughts: "The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said today that the results of a Women’s Health Initiative (WHI) study on the effects of combined estrogen with progestin therapy on the incidence of dementia and memory impairment do not at this time dictate any changes to the FDA-approved uses of these drug therapies. FDA is [...]
No More Free Lunches: The BMJ have an excellent themed issue on the interaction between industry and healthcare professionals.
"Free pens and pizza lunches. Sponsored conferences and compromised medical education. Courtesy golf and unaffordable holidays. Thought leaders and ghost writers. These are the trappings of doctors and drug companies being entwined in an embrace of [...]
Patient Pack Campaign: The Pharmaceutical Journal’s campaign for patient packs is gathering a head of steam.
Drug Driving: "Over-the-counter medicines have inconsistent and inaccurate labels that pose a danger to drivers, the Department of Transport says.
The Department commissioned research from Loughborough University as part of a programme of research into the effects of drugs on driving. It found that British National Formulary recommended labelling is not always followed by [...]
Stephen Evans at the Problems and Perils of Prescription Medicines conference at the Royal College of Physicians on the 22nd of May, discussing the recent paper on MMR by Geier and Geier.:
"The absolute junk that was published recently in the Journal of International Paediatrics in the June Issue, you can go and look at it [...]
The Safety of Patients is in the Palm of your Hand?: "New information technologies, particularly personal digital assistants (PDAs), are able to provide readily accessible medical information at the point-of-care. Although definitive studies are still necessary, the bedside use of these portable electronic devices, equipped with relevant, reliable and accurate drug, medical reference and [...]
MMR and the media: The BBC report some evidence that the public debate about MMR is skewed to the detriment of the children’s health:
"People have been misled by media reports that the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine could be unsafe, according to new research.
A survey by Cardiff University claims that more than half of the [...]
Not So Complementary: Confidence in Australia’s complementary medicines industry has been shaken after the Therapeutic Goods Administration (TGA) suspended the production licence of Pan Pharmaceuticals-Australia’s leading manufacturer of complementary medicines.
After a 3-month audit, the TGA suspended Pan’s licence for 6 months on April 28. The audit found evidence of manipulation of test results,
substandard manufacturing [...]