Adverse drug events caused by medication errors in medical inpatients.

Principles: In view of growing concern in recent years regarding medication errors as causes of adverse drug events (ADEs), we explore the frequency and characteristics of error-associated ADEs in medical inpatients.

Methods: All patients with ADEs or ADErelated hospital admission in a cohort of medical inpatients identified by "event monitoring" (SAS/CHDM database, Br J Clin Pharmacol 2000:49:158-67) were evaluated independently by two experienced physicians. ADEs were first divided into ADEs occurring during cohort stay (incident ADE) and ADE present prior to/at admission.

Classification of ADRs: a proposal for harmonization and differentiation based on the experience of the Comprehensive Hospital Drug Monitoring Bern/St. Gallen, 1974-1993.

The present paper deals with the classification of adverse drug reactions (ADRs) according to today's largely accepted pathomechanisms. The classification system applied, relies primarily on the proposals of Rawlins and Thomson with type A ('augmented') and B ('bizarre') reactions. In the database of the Comprehensive Hospital Drug Monitoring (CHDM) Bern/St.

No clinically relevant drug interaction between paracetamol and phenprocoumon based on a pharmacoepidemiological cohort study in medical inpatients.

Objective: A recent case control study suggests that paracetamol at a dosage above 1300 mg/day increases the anticoagulant effects of warfarin. In many European countries, phenprocoumon and not warfarin is used as an anticoagulant. However, the effects of paracetamol on the anticoagulant effects of phenprocoumon have so far not been evaluated.

Cardiovascular drug utilization and its determinants in unselected medical patients with ischemic heart disease.

Background: In patients with ischemic heart disease (IHD), secondary preventive drug therapy improves overall prognosis. Therefore, this study evaluated cardiovascular drug utilization in patients suffering from IHD, identified factors influencing drug utilization, and determined the prevalence of shortfalls of antithrombotic, beta-blocker, and lipid-lowering drug use. Methods: This study is based on data recorded prospectively between 1996 and 1998 in two Swiss teaching hospitals for the SAS/CHDM pharmacoepidemiologic database project.