Some drug side effects only identified after hitting market

VANCOUVER (NEWS1130) - You read the directions carefully and then take the pills... and expect them to work; every year, more than 10,000 Canadians die from taking prescription drugs exactly as they were prescribed.

From heartburn pills that cause heart attacks to anti-depressants that lead to suicide, Maclean's magazine is spotlighting drug side effects and dangers that are often identified only after they come to market.

"It's a complicated issue. There are dangers associated with prescription drugs that we're not talking about and our regulatory system is not necessarily equipped to communicate those dangers to us," says Ann Kingston, a senior writer with Maclean's.

In 2000, Conservative MP Terrence Young's daughter collapsed died of heart failure while taking an acid reflux drug that has since been pulled from the market.

"Nobody thought there was any problem with [the drug] but as Mr. Young investigated after the death, he learned that there were huge dangers associated with it and that Health Canada knew about them and warned doctors. But the mechanism for warning doctors is not always effective in that doctors are swamped; they're not up to date on what's going on with drugs," says Kingston.

"As a result, there were close to 100 deaths in North America from this drug. It's been taken off the market but that pushed Terrence Young's crusade. He has a private members bill in front of Parliament."

Kingston also writes about a young man who went to his doctor and was given a sample package of an anti-depressant; four days after taking the drug he committed suicide, a known possible side effect that was not made clear on the packaging of the drug sample.

"There are many more examples. This is about people understanding the drugs they're taking and what the consequences are," she says, adding it can even be difficult for doctors to keep up to date on new drugs when seeing dozens of patients in a day and dealing with drug warnings that are not always clearly stated.

"You cannot always be sure that a new drug has had a wide application in terms of testing. Be cautious about new drugs; understand that the drug you're taking is a new drug, because clinical trials only give you a small snapshot of how the drug is going to work in the real world," explains Kingston.

She also feels Canada should adopt the transparency in drug labelling seen in other countries.

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Some drug side effects only identified after hitting market