Idea #320 for January 4th, 2010: Measuring Up or The Importance of Properly Measuring Liquid Medications

When measuring out a dose of liquid medication, is a kitchen spoon a good enough utensil? Pouring a spoonful of cough medicine may seem like a harmless estimation, but research shows that this practice is unnecessarily dangerous. Not all spoons are created equal, so a teaspoon of medicine may fill each kitchen spoon differently. A study showed that people attempting to measure out a certain volume of liquid medicine in kitchen spoons of various sizes were off by an average of about 10%.

Administering a mis-measured dose of medicine to a child could have dire consequences. The best way to avoid mistakes is to use measuring caps or dosing spoons that were provided along with the medication. The few seconds you might save by eyeballing the liquid in a kitchen spoon is not worth the potential risk of over-medicating a child.

Read more about this issue here.

Idea #318 for January 2nd, 2010: Pill Police or Fighting Prescription Drug Abuse

Prescription drug abuse remains a major issue in the US, and the problem is growing more widespread. Between the years 2006 and 2007, prescription drug abuse jumped by more than 10% while use of street drugs declined. Meanwhile, in the decade preceding 2007, the number of prescriptions filled jumped 72%. This greater availability of prescription meds may be related to the rise in abuse.

People are able to obtain these drugs in a few ways. More than half are able to get them from a friend or relative who may have leftover drugs that were legitimately prescribed to them. Some are able to order drugs from the internet without a valid prescription. And others are able to convince a provider to prescribe them drugs for a faked medical condition. Cracking down on the illegal sale of prescription drugs online may curb the abuse to some extent. But the biggest challenge will be to curb the sharing of medications that are legitimately prescribed.

Read more about this story here.

Idea #297 for December 12th, 2009: Closing The Gap or Ensuring Stroke Patients Receive Life-Saving Drugs

Victims of ischemic stroke, in which blood flow to the brain is blocked by a clot, can reduce the likelihood of future strokes with medication. However, about 20% of them do not take those medications, which may be costing some of them their lives. Drugs like blood thinners, including the over-the-counter drug aspirin, can help prevent recurrence of stroke.

The groups most likely to take the medications are men, older patients, and non-Hispanic patients. Currently, it is not known why these demographics are more likely to take proper medication, but socio-economic factors may be at play. If further research reveals that to be the case, we’ll need to focus efforts on ensuring that all groups receive adequate medications for this. When a life-saving drug can be something as simple and ubiquitous as aspirin, there’s no excuse for 20% of patients missing out.

Read more about this here.

Idea #295 for December 10th, 2009: Know Your Meds or Hospital Patients Unaware of Drugs They Are Taking

Many hospital patients are often unaware of the medicines they are taking, a new study suggests. In fact, 96% of patients surveyed were unable to accurately recall every medication they received during their hospital stay. And 44% of them believed they were taking a medication that, in reality, they were not given. Lack of communication is thought to be the underlying cause of the problem.

Of those surveyed, less than 30% claimed they had seen their medication list. If patients are made better aware of the drugs they are prescribed in a hospital, it could help them identify possible allergies or other oversights. Even if hospitals do not change the current culture of medication communication, there are some steps patients can take to become better informed. For one, patients should ask about what drugs they are being given and what side-effects they should expect. Also, if patients could bring a list of their current prescriptions to the hospital, it would assist hospital staff in avoiding interactions or allergies.

Read more about this here:

Idea #289 for December 4th, 2009: Playing With Fire or FDA Looking At Side Effects of Antipsychotic Drugs on Children

A group of drugs called atypical antipsychotics are widely used to treat a number of psychiatric conditions including schizophrenia and depression. They are sometimes prescribed to children, but the FDA is now asking for further study on the matter. Research has shown that children who take these drugs are at increased risk of experiencing adverse metabolic side effects.

Metabolic side effects include problems like weight gain, high blood pressure, diabetes, and high cholesterol. There is also the larger debate regarding these medications and whether young children should be given powerful antipsychotic drugs in the first place. Increasingly, children are being prescribed these drugs for unapproved uses, like for treating ADHD, without knowing the long-term effects they may have. The FDA should take a good look at how these drugs are prescribed, their side effects, and whether the benefits outweigh the mounting negatives associated with them.

Read more about this issue here.

Idea #286 for December 1st, 2009: Keep Those Meds To Yourselves or The Problem With Sharing Prescription Drugs

There’s a large problem in the US with people selling prescription medications on the black market for recreational use. But there’s another problem involving people who are sharing their medications with others to provide assistance. Twenty percent of teens admit to have given some of their prescription drugs to friends. They might think they’re just helping out a friend by sharing their prescription, like giving some antibiotic pills, but the results can be more harmful than helpful.

Of the people surveyed who had received medications from another person’s prescription, a quarter experienced some side effects. People who receive the drugs may not be informed of potential interactions or allergies that may come into play. Side effects aren’t the only problems; sharing things like eye drops can spread infections rather than contain them. And misusing antibiotics can contribute to drug resistant bacteria strains like MRSA. Two ways to address this problem are: better informing patients of the risks involved in sharing meds, and increasing access to programs that take back expired and unwanted medications, so that patients do not have to accumulate old medications.

Read more about this issue here.

Idea #284 for November 29th, 2009: Hidden Risks or Some Pregnant Women Unaware of Medications’ Dangers

Pregnant women are often unaware of the possible effects that medications can have on their unborn children. Certain drugs used to treat acne, anxiety, as well as antibiotics can all be detrimental to fetal health. Yet a study shows that some women continue taking those, and other risky drugs, during pregnancy.

A Canadian study of over 100,000 pregnant women found that over half filled at least one prescription during pregnancy, and 6% took a medication that can be problematic for unborn children. Potential risks include miscarriage and birth defects. There is a need for greater awareness among pregnant women about the side effects their medication may pose. The best way to inform them is to make sure that their healthcare providers review their medications as soon as they are aware of the pregnancy.

Read more about this study here.

Idea #278 for November 23rd, 2009: Tag-Team Healthcare or Physicians and Pharmacists Working Together To Improve Patient Outcomes

Under normal circumstances, a physician prescribes a high-blood pressure medication and a pharmacist fills the prescription as written. But when doctor and pharmacist work together, patients with hypertension fare better. New research supports that notion: a study of 400 hypertensive patients showed that patients whose pharmacists and doctors worked together had much better outcomes.

In this case, working together meant that both physician and pharmacist had a say in the medications and dosages the patient received. In the control group, whose patients were prescribed blood pressure medications in the conventional manner, 30% of the patients saw their blood pressure drop to the recommended level within six months. On the other hand, 64% of patients who had the physician/pharmacist team working together reached that level in the same time frame. That’s a remarkable difference.

Methods like this are being employed by some practices in the country already. If the results of the study hold up, it makes sense to expand this type of collaboration. Previous research has shown similar success in treating other conditions like diabetes and high cholesterol with this system as well. The authors of the study think we can encourage more collaboration by employing incentives via Medicare payments for those who setup these partnerships.

Read more about this news here.

Idea #266 for November 11th, 2009: Spirit of Cooperation or Drug Companies Setting Competition Aside For Patient Safety

It’s rare that competing drug companies team together to work on a common problem. But that’s just what Biogen, Elan, and Roche are doing right now. The problem is a condition called progressive multifocal leukoencephalopathy (PML) and two different drugs have been found to increase the risk of the rare neurological condition. So these three drugmakers are coming together and sharing data to find out why their drugs might be causing PML in some patients.

The drug Tysabri, which is used to treat multiple sclerosis, is sold by under a joint venture between Biogen and Elan but was taken off the market this year because of its link to PML. Also pulled this year due to ties to PML was Roche’s psoriasis drug Raptiva. The drugmakers involved will create a global database of PML cases that will be used to predict, prevent, and treat infections. While their motivation for this collaboration might be driven in part by a desire to get their drugs back on the market, it’s still nice to see drug companies put patients ahead of secrecy and competition. More of these collaborations would be welcome in the future, whenever multiple drugs are linked to a common debilitating side effect.

Read more about this in the Wall St Journal.

Idea #227 for October 3rd, 2009: Fight Fire With Fire or An Effective But Controversial Heroin Treatment

Could administering heroin to addicts actually help in the recovery from drug addiction? Surprisingly, the answer could be yes, according to a study in England. A four-year trial has found success in giving daily injections to heroin addicts to wean them off the drug, and has proven more effective than methadone and other treatments. Within 6 months, three-quarters of participants in the study had largely given up heroin, and the average number of crimes they committed decreased to a third of what it had been at the start.

In Switzerland, where a similar program has been in place for years, less than 15% of the patients revert back to daily use following treatment. In the US, over 3 million people have used heroin at least once. The number of addicts is likely in the hundreds-of-thousands. It might be difficult to convince the public that administering an illegal drug to addicts is a smart move, but the results don’t lie. But it should at least be part of the conversation of how we treat drug addiction in this country, especially because it has the added effect of lowering crime.

Read about this trial in Time.