Prescribed Medications and the Public Health

An alarming look at America's other drug problem--medication safety! Drug misadventures are an all-too-frequent and deadly cause of adverse medical events. Prescribed Medications and the Public Health: Laying the Foundation for Risk Reduction explores ways to combat the widespread problem of adverse drug events (ADEs). This comprehensive book shows how our broken health care and medication use system often inflicts harm--most of it preventable--on patients. Strategies are presented to help health care managers, health professionals, regulators, and policymakers to dynamically improve the entire system. With the growing use of prescribed medications comes a rising number of adverse drug reactions, drug interactions, allergic reactions, and medication errors. Prescribed Medications and the Public Health discusses problems such as drug supply issues, drug defects, counterfeit drugs, limitations for oversight of Internet prescriptions, inaccurate splitting of pills, and poor administration of drugs. The book examines the issues from all angles, including patient considerations, drug factors, and unsafe practices that contribute to ADEs. Liability costs for drug injury are reviewed, along with effective practical strategies for preventing, reducing, detecting, and documenting adverse drug events. National and local plans are explored to help achieve the essential goal of greater safety throughout the system. The text is extensively referenced and includes approximately 50 figures and tables to clearly present information. Prescribed Medications and the Public Health reviews in detail how to battle these problems in both inpatient and ambulatory care: adverse drug reactions dangerous allergic reactions harmful drug interactions medication errors adverse vaccine reactions drug misadventuresPrescribed Medications and the Public Health is crucial reading for medication safety officers; pharmacoepidemiologists; medication safety experts; educators and students in schools of pharmacy and public health, medicine, nursing, and hospital/health services management; health care managers; regulators; policymakers; and advocates for improving drug safety.