Wednesday, January 02, 2008
Do You Always Check the Diagnosis for Look.
The Institute for Safe Drug Practices (ISMP) had several reports of mix-ups in which the antidiabetic representative AMARYL (glimepiride) had been dispensed to geriatric patients instead of the Alzheimer’s drug REMINYL (galantamine).
Each drug is available in a 4 mg pad, although other cake strengths are also available for each drug.
In one case, a 78-year-old social class with a past of Alzheimer’s disease was admitted to the healthcare facility with hypoglycemia (blood glucose on acknowledgment 27 mg/dL).
A examination of the medications she was taking at home revealed that her pharmacist dispensed Amaryl 4 mg, which she took BID instead of Reminyl 4 mg BID.
In another case, an 89-year-old animate being received Amaryl instead of Reminyl for 3 days, eventually requiring medical care for communicating of severe hypoglycemia.
A position semantic role received Amaryl instead of Reminyl while in the medical building, leadership to severe hypoglycemia.
All patients recovered with artistic style.
These events have been linked to poor prescriber committal to writing and sound-alike, look-alike names.
It’s possible action that prescriptions for Amaryl are more commonly ordered than those for Reminyl, thus, causing info bias (seeing that which is most servant, while overlooking any disconfirming evidence), which may lead pharmacists or nurses to “automatically” believing a Reminyl ethical drug is for Amaryl.
Obviously, accidental governing body of Amaryl poses great condition to any patient role, especially an older case, who may be more sensitive to its hypoglycemic effects.
Practitioners should be alerted to the potential difference for fault between Amaryl and Reminyl.
Prescribers should be reminded to indicate the medication’s aim on prescriptions.
Consider construction alerts about potentiality cognitive state into estimator purchase order subject matter systems and/or adding admonisher labels to chemist’s shop containers.
Patients (or caregivers) should be educated about all of their medications, so they are spirit with each product’s name, function, and expected coming into court.
Most importantly, pharmacists and nurses should confirm that the participant role is a diabetic before dispensing or administering any antidiabetic medicament.
This is a part of article Do You Always Check the Diagnosis for Look. Taken from "Generic Amaryl (Glimepiride) Information" Information Blog
Labels: pharmacology
