Safe Prescribing Flashcards
(14 cards)
What are commonly prescribed dangerous drugs examples?
Warfarin
Phenytoin
Theophylline
Lithium
Digoxin
Amiodrone
Macrolides
NSAIDS
Verapamil
Carbamazapine
Rare adverse reaction of paracetamol
Can cause thrombocytopenia (low platelets), leucopenia (low white cell count) and neutropenia (low neutrophils)
Define adverse drug reaction
A response to a drug with is noxious and unintended which occurs in doses normally used for prophylaxis, diagnosis or therapy for a diease.
Side effect definition
Any unintended effect caused at doses normally used in man which is related to the pharmacological properties of the drug.
What are the 3 different types of drug interactions
Drug-Drug (rare)
Drug-Food
Drug-Disease (contraindicated)
Type A reactions
- Normally pharmacological effects which are undesirable
- Dose dependent, predictable
- Increases morbidity, but death is rare
Type B reactions
- Bizarre
- Unrelated to pharmacology
- Rare, unpredictable, unrelated to dose
- Reactions often severe/fatal
Management of Type A reactions
Dose adjustment of alternative agent
Management of Type B reactions
Stop medication
Example of Type A reaction
Sedation in opioids
Example of Type B reaction
Aplastic anaemia from Chloramphenicol (bone marrow cannot produce enough RBCs)
Morbidity
Illness within a population
Mortality
Refers to death rate of a population
Predisposing factors to adverse drug reactions
- Multiple drug therapies
- Age
- Gender
- Intercurrent disease e.g. liver/renal
- Race and genetic polymorphism
