FDA Initiative Seeks to Reduce Accidental Overdoses

Nov. 5 -- WEDNESDAY, Nov. 4 (HealthDay News) -- U.S. health authorities unveiled Wednesday an initiative designed to reduce preventable injuries and deaths caused by misuse of medications.

The Safe Use Initiative will focus on preventable injuries and deaths caused by "medication errors such as unintentional exposures, misuse, abuse and attempts at self- harm," Dr. Janet Woodcock, director of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, said at a press conference.

"Many errors are also caused by lack of information needed by prescribers at the point of care, or by patients or consumers at the point of use, as well as by procedural and process errors -- for example, dispensing the wrong drug or wrong strength of drug," she said. "This must be better managed because preventable injuries and deaths cause significant harm to patients and enormous costs to the health-care system and significant cost to society as a whole."

Dr. Margaret A. Hamburg, head of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, added: "We have a collective obligation to address this."

The announcement coincided with the release of a report titled FDA's Safe Use Initiative -- Collaborating to Reduce Preventable Harm from Medicines.

Related Stories

10-month-old baby has been found: Officials

• May 6, 7:21 PM

Vehicle crashes into White House gate, killing 1

• May 5, 2:53 AM

Man kills wife, 3 kids in mass shooting: Police

• Apr 23, 12:35 PM

"When I started to look at some of the research, I was fairly stunned at the scope of the problem," Hamburg said, adding that four million visits to "emergency departments, doctors' offices and outpatient-care facilities are due to medication misuse or overdose."

Misuse of prescription drugs also results in 100,000 hospitalizations each year. And an estimated 1.5 million preventable drug-related injuries occur in health-care settings alone, Hamburg said.

"Up to half of all medication-related injuries could be prevented using currently available knowledge," she said.

Hamburg said the FDA plans to "enlist stakeholders across the nation to develop interventions," meaning patients, consumers, health-care practitioners, pharmacists, insurers, drug manufacturers as well as other government agencies.