TELL THE TRUTH - DO YOU HAVE HYPOCH...
Did you know that as we get older a certain type of cell in our stomach called the parietal cell becomes less productive. This little cell is responsible for making our hydrochloric acid. This acid keeps our stomach at a pH...
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WHAT'S IN A NAME?
This is a synopsis of an article from the American Medical News.
According to this article there are 3,170 pairs of drug names that look or sound alike and can be confused causing a medication error.
In January 2008, the United States Pharmacopeia reported that there were 30,000 drug-name mistakes that caused harm 1.4% of the time and resulted in seven deaths.
Some of the medications listed with the largest number of look or sound alike names included cefazolin (15), lisinopril (13), enalapril (12), prednisone (12), trazodone (12), metronidazole (11), diazepam (10), levothyroxine (10), and labetalol (10).
One recommendation to protect you from one of these potential errors is to ask your doctor to write on your prescription what you medication is for. This would also benefit patients on multiple medications. Who knows, it could save a life and it might be yours.
By Dr. E. Glynn Taunton on April 27, 2008 1:16 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)
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