HYDERABAD: The Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission (IPC) has launched a mission to get information about the side-effects of drugs being prescribed by doctors in the country. Considering that there is practically no mechanism for reporting about side-effects by patients or maintaining such a data base by hospitals or doctors, the IPC organised a two-day programme at the National Institute of Nutrition (NIN) here with an aim to streamline efforts in that directions.
Doctors and teaching faculty from 60 medical colleges in South India took part in the programme which ended on Tuesday. "When a drug is prescribed to a patient, it's efficacy is important and getting to know the side-effects it causes is also important. The adverse reactions the drug causes largely goes unreported. Either patients do not tell or doctors do not ask. Even if the adverse reactions are known, no data base has been created to analyse how the drug works," NIN deputy director B Dinesh Kumar told The Times of India.
Only when the side-effects of drugs or adverse reactions they cause are known, some initiative can be taken to get the drug withdrawn from the market or ban it.
The two-day meet was aimed with medical colleges deans, professors and doctors was aimed at putting in a network in place for interactions with doctors, those in the pharma business and patients. Another two-day meet will be organised in Ahmedabad on December 13 and 14 for doctors from the Western part of the country.
It may be mentioned here that a toll free helpline was put in place by the Indian Pharmacopoeia Commission so that patients can report any adverse reactions for drugs that they have been prescribed by doctors. The toll free number 1800 180 3024 was inaugurated by Dr Sten Olsson, chief, WHO Programme Officer, WHO-Uppsala Monitoring Centre, Sweden on October 11.
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