Reports of adverse drug effects on the rise

The Food and Drug Administration received 2½ times more reports of serious health problems linked to medication in 2005 than it did in 1998, a study reports today. Reports of serious problems grew four times faster than the total number of U.S. outpatient prescriptions, according to the Archives of Internal Medicine. Such medication-related health problems account for an estimated 3% to 6% of hospital admissions, they write. "The overall message is that the drug-safety evaluation system is not working," says co-author Curt Furberg, a medical epidemiologist at Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, N.C., and former member of the FDA's drug safety and risk management advisory panel. "Harmful drugs are getting into the marketplace."

Steve - from the horror stories we hear on an almost daily basis, we are surprised the numbers are not higher. The public does seem to be heeding the call and paying more attention to the type and number of medications they consume.