Recurrence of Adverse Drug Reactions following Inappropriate Re-Prescription: Better Documentation, Availability of Information and Monitoring are Needed

• Published in: Drug safety 2010-07, Vol.33 (7), p.535-538
• Main Authors: van der Linden, Carolien M. J., Jansen, Paul A. F., van Marum, Rob J., Grouls, René J. E., Korsten, Erik H. M., Egberts, Antoine C. G.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adverse and side effects; Asthma; Biological and medical sciences; Clinical trial. Drug monitoring; Computerized, statistical medical data processing and models in biomedicine; Current Opinion; Diseases; Drug Safety and Pharmacovigilance; Drug therapy; Drug toxicity and drugs side effects treatment; Drugs; General pharmacology; Medical sciences; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Miscellaneous (drug allergy, mutagens, teratogens...); Pharmacology. Drug treatments; Pharmacology/Toxicology; Relapse
• ISSN: 0114-5916; 1179-1942
• DOI: 10.2165/11532350-000000000-00000

Adverse drug reactions (ADRs) are a common, and often preventable, cause of hospital admission, especially in the elderly, and can occur during hospitalization. In this current opinion article, we present three cases of recurrence of a serious ADR due to re-prescription of a withdrawn medication that highlight the need for a system to prevent the undesirable re-prescription of medications withdrawn because of an ADR. In addition, we describe an electronic system that could help prevent undesirable re-prescription following an ADR. Such a system should document ADRs systematically at the patient level, make this information available to relevant healthcare providers and the patient, and flag re-prescription of the offending drug. The effectiveness and cost effectiveness of such a system would need to be determined.