Category Archives: Drug Side Effects

http://www.DrugRisks.com is the most helpful resource on the web for prescription medication alerts, side effects and legal news. Visit us today New York, NY (PRWEB) April 18, 2013 DrugRisks is designed to improve the safety of those taking popular prescription drugs like Actos by providing the latest warnings, recalls, studies and legal news. Visitors can determine if other patients are experiencing similar side effects and decide if they need legal advice. The FDA and European Medicines Agency* have warned that taking Actos for longer than one year may be associated with an increased risk of bladder cancer. Regulators in France and Germany have even banned its use**. DrugRisks has learned as many as 3,000 patients in the U.S. have filed an Actos lawsuit against Takeda Pharmaceuticals over allegations their drug caused bladder cancer***. The first trial is underway for Jack Cooper, a grandfather who is now terminally ill from the disease***. Now, the resource center has added legal news showing lawyers are finishing their closing arguments and the jury could begin deliberations as soon as Tuesday or Wednesday this week. A decision is expected soon***. Lawyers continue to help those diagnosed with bladder cancer after taking Actos file claims. Anyone … Continue reading →

Apr. 19, 2013 Yellow vision, pseudo-pulmonary obstruction, involuntary body movements, respiratory paralysis. These are some of the 1,600 known side effects (SEs) produced by drugs. Adverse effects are one of the main causes of hospital admission in the west. These effects are difficult to predict, and in practice specific assays are required to test the safety of agents in pre-clinical phases, thus these effects are often not discovered until the drug has been launched. A study published by scientists at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona) seeks to fill this information gap. The objective of the study is to shed light on the molecular bases of SEs and provide medical chemists with the tools to design safer drugs and to predict their effects. The study collects and proposes molecular hypotheses for 1,162 side effects. This information, which is about to be tested experimentally, is now available to the scientific community through the most recent issue of the specialized journal Chemistry and Biology, part of the Cell group. The researchers Miquel Duran and Patrick Aloy collated all the drugs that cause each known SE. Next, they studied the proteins with which they interact and their chemical structure. "For most … Continue reading →

dOliveira & Associates has issued a new infographic providing information on a Tekturna medical study that was stopped due to patients suffering from nonfatal stroke, hyperkalemia, and hypotension. (PRWEB) April 18, 2013 According to a press release from Novartis, the company stopped its ALTITUDE medical study in December of 2011 because Tekturna increased the risk of nonfatal stroke, kidney complications, hyperkalemia, and hypotension in patients with Type-2 diabetes. The study was conducted on the part of Novartis in an effort to expand the uses of Tekturna due to the product profitability in 2011 was negative (iv). Additional adverse events were recorded by The Institute for Safe Medication Practices in there October of 2012 issue of Quarter Watch which stated that 100 cases of angioedema (swelling) were reported by Tekturna patients in the first quarter of 2012 (v). The same publication also detailed other cases that included one report of death, two reports labeled life threatening, 15 reports of hospitalization, and a final total of 237 Tekturna adverse event reports, more than any other blood pressure medication (v). The infographic issued by dOliveira & Associates provides general information on Tekturna as well as lists possible side effects. Side effects allegedly connected … Continue reading →

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Federal health experts issued a split opinion Thursday on whether a long-acting testosterone injection from Endo Health Solutions is safe. A Food and Drug Administration panel voted 9-9 on the safety of Endo's Aveed, a drug designed to be injected once every 10 weeks to boost testosterone in men with abnormally low levels. The FDA is not required to follow the group's advice, though it often does. Endo has asked the FDA to approve its drug as a long-term treatment for hypogonadism, or low testosterone caused by disease or damage to the reproductive or hormonal organs. The condition is associated with fatigue, weight gain, depression and reduced libido. Estimates for the number of men in the U.S. with low testosterone levels range from 5 million to 30 million, depending on the criteria used. While there are established numbers for typical testosterone levels in younger men, there is no consensus on what is a "normal number," in older men. The split panel vote is the latest twist in Aveed's multiyear review by the FDA. The Malvern, Pa-based drugmaker first submitted the drug in 2007, but the FDA rejected it in 2008 and again in 2009. Regulators have continued … Continue reading →

New York, NY (PRWEB) April 18, 2013 The prescription drug safety advocates at DrugRisk.com are announcing the launch of a new resource center for patients who have taken the diabetes drug Januvia, amid warnings that the drug may be related to pancreatic cancer and thyroid cancer. The goal of DrugRisk is to improve patient safety by providing those taking prescription drugs with the latest warnings, recalls, studies and legal news. Patients can see if others are experiencing similar side effects and decide if they need legal advice. Januvia is a once-a-day pill introduced in 2006 to help those with type-2 diabetes control blood sugar. It has become Mercks best-selling drug, with sales over $4 billion last year*. However, DrugRisk has added a 2011 study from UCLA indicating the drug could increase the risk of pancreatic cancer by 272% and thyroid cancer by 148%**. The Journal for the American Medical Association also recently published findings showing Januvia could double the risk of pancreatitis, which is a risk factor for pancreatic cancer***. Now, DrugRisk has learned that, with the number of patients filing a Januvia lawsuit alleging cancer growing, lawyers have requested that cases be consolidated to a special federal multi-district court … Continue reading →

OxyContin's long-acting formulation makes it popular but also prone to abuse. OxyContin's long-acting formulation makes it popular but also prone to abuse. Banning cheaper, generic forms of a dangerous drug sounds like a worthy idea. But the Food and Drug Administration's decision to bar generic OxyContin may also push patients towards less effective drugs without eliminating the risk of addiction, experts say. "Obviously, there's a cost issue," says Lynn Webster, president of the American Academy of Pain Medicine. "Not having generics means this type of medication is going to be more expensive." On Tuesday, the FDA said that it won't approve generic versions of the original formulation of OxyContin, a long-acting narcotic pain medication, which went off patent that day. Normally, the end of the patent's life would open the door to generics. But drugmakers must now develop their own abuse-resistant versions if they want to compete for a share of the lucrative market. In 2010, Purdue Pharma LP replaced the original OxyContin with an abuse-resistant form, in an effort to reduce deaths and overdoses caused by the powerful pain medication, which was licensed in 1995. From 1999 to 2006, deaths involving prescription opioid painkillers more than tripled, according to … Continue reading →

Many family doctors find out about new drugs on the market through sales calls with representatives from drug companies, but they aren't always informed about possible harmful effects, a Canadian researcher says. Sales pitches usually include promotional material, free samples and information about the benefits or harmful effects of the drugs. As part of a study in the Journal of General Internal Medicine, 255 Canadian, American and French physicians reported on 1,692 drug-specific promotions. In Vancouver and Montreal, 66 per cent of doctors surveyed said sales reps did not provide information on the potential harmful effects of the drugs they were pitching. "Physicians were rarely informed about serious adverse events, raising questions about whether current approaches to regulation of sales representatives adequately protect patient health," Dr. Joel Lexchin of York University in Toronto and his co-authors concluded. Serious side-effects were mentioned in only six per cent of the promotions even though about half of the drugs involved came with the strongest type of warnings that Health Canada issues. Lexchin suggested that patients be proactive and ask their doctors about side-effects. He also recommended several objective sources of information on drugs: Canada's Therapeutics Letter - free. Prescrire International (translation of the … Continue reading →

New York, NY (PRWEB) April 17, 2013 The prescription drug safety advocates at DrugRisk.com are alerting patients taking the blood thinner Pradaxa of updated legal news on the site. A federal judge overseeing hundreds of lawsuits alleging Pradaxa internal bleeding has issued an order setting rules for the upcoming start of trials. DrugRisk was created to improve the safety of those taking prescription drugs by sharing the latest warnings, recalls, studies and legal news. Patients can see if others are experiencing similar side effects and decide if they need legal advice. Experts have disagreed over whether Pradaxa, launched in 2010 to prevent strokes in patients with atrial fibrillation, causes higher risks of internal bleeding. The FDA recently advised that Pradaxa is no more dangerous than traditional blood thinner warfarin*. The Institute for Safe Medication Practices, however, warned that patients suffering Pradaxa bleeding are almost 5 times as likely to die than those with bleeding from warfarin. They also named anticoagulants like Pradaxa among the most dangerous drugs**. Already, more than 260 patients have filed a Pradaxa lawsuit alleging internal bleeding from the drug, which have been consolidated to a special federal court in Illinois. The case is formally known as … Continue reading →

OTTAWAThe Conservative government could require doctors to report negative side effects that Canadians experience from prescription drugs as part of efforts to increase the oversight mediations after they hit the market. Were looking at whether or not we need to make some regulatory or legislative changes to mandate or compel information to come in, Dr. Supriya Sharma, a senior medical adviser and assistant deputy minister at Health Canada, told the Star in an interview Tuesday. A Star investigation into the safety of prescription drugs highlighted problems with the way Health Canada collects and analyzes reports of adverse drug reactions, as well as the secrecy surrounding what the regulator learns about whether the drugs are harmful, or if they work for some patients. Health Canada has traditionally relied upon manufacturers, distributors, doctors and ordinary Canadians to submit adverse drug reaction reports, but government studies have suggested it captures only a tiny fraction of the total side effects experienced by patients outside clinical trials and it can take up to two years for the federal regulator to issue a warning about it. Still, there is a lack of consensus over whether extending legal requirements to report adverse drug reactions to health-care practitioners … Continue reading →

Public release date: 16-Apr-2013 [ | E-mail | Share ] Contact: Bryan Alary bryan.alary@ualberta.ca 780-492-0436 University of Alberta (Edmonton) A University of Alberta researcher is thinking small to find innovative ways to improve the delivery of drugs that can be more easily administered with fewer side-effects. Afsaneh Lavasanifar, a professor in the Faculty of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences, has developed and patented a polymer platform technology that can carry drugs to specific areas of the body at a nanoscopic scale. The polymeric nanostructures contain an outer shell and inner core that are capable of encapsulating drugs that the body normally has a hard time absorbing and processing. "Making drugs water soluble is a major problem in drug development," Lavasanifar says. "When drugs are not water soluble, they cannot be absorbed efficiently by the body or administered efficiently, making them ineffective." Lavasanifar developed the polymer over three years and published her initial findings in 2006. With support from TEC Edmonton, in 2010 she launched her own company, Meros Polymers, and currently serves as vice-president and chief science officer. The company secured a U.S. patent for the polymer late last year, with patents pending in Europe and Japan, and was recently named … Continue reading →