Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Pet parents urged to scrutinize drug prescriptions


Like humans, animals can receive the wrong type or dose of a prescription drug. But pet parents can take precautions to minimize such errors, according to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
In a recently published article, “Medication Errors Happen to Pets, Too,” the FDA’sCenter for Veterinary Medicine (CVM) urges consumers to ensure they fully understand a prescription they receive from a veterinarian. Among the details that pet parents should know is the exact name of the drug and the proper dosage.
The CVM, based in Rockville, Md., said medicine mix-ups can happen for many reasons. For example, a pharmacist in a human pharmacy may be unfamiliar with veterinary abbreviations, a veterinarian may write a prescription with poor penmanship, or a pharmacist may dispense the wrong drug if its name or packaging is similar to that of the correct drug.
"Mistakes can happen at the veterinary clinic, but also in the pharmacy which fills the prescription, and at home, when the pet owner gives the animal the meds," said Linda Kim-Jung, a safety reviewer in CVM's Division of Veterinary Product Safety.
The issue of pet medication errors has received significant attention elsewhere. For instance, theOregon Veterinary Medical Association, which recently surveyed animal hospitals across the state, said it found that brick-and-mortar pharmacies and online outlets sometimes change doses or switch to different drugs without consulting the veterinarians who issued the prescriptions. The association cited several examples in which cats and dogs had to be euthanized because their health declined after receiving the wrong drug or dosage.
But Gary Schnabel, executive director of the Oregon Board of Pharmacy, which regulates drug sales in the state, told Examiner.com Dec. 12 that “so far nobody has provided the Board of Pharmacy with a name or a real case that we could investigate. Clearly, it’s not compliant if that’s going on and pharmacists are doing what has been alleged. We want to know about it so we could stop it … but we don’t have any evidence that it’s happening.”
Source found here

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