This year, an estimated 4.5 billion prescriptions filled will be in the U.S., and with about half of consumers taking at least one prescription medication within the next 30-days. In fact, according to a recent JD Power study only 10% of people talk to their pharmacist when picking up their medications. To help improve communication… Continue reading Six Tips to Improve Communication With Your Pharmacist
Tag: prescription medication
5 Tips for Getting Smarter About Medications in 2016
With 4 in 10 Americans regularly taking a prescription medication and nearly $260 billion spent by consumers on prescriptions in 2014, expert pharmacist Dr. Linda Bernstein, a spokesperson for FamilyWize, is offering the following tips to help consumers get healthier with their medications in 2016: Know what medicine you are taking and why you are taking it:You should know at… Continue reading 5 Tips for Getting Smarter About Medications in 2016
Too Many Pills for Seniors?
Although older Americans get mental-health medications at more than twice the rate of younger adults, they are much less likely to see a psychiatrist, according to new research. That raises questions about whether they could be at risk of problems caused by a collision of multiple medications – and about whether primary care doctors may… Continue reading Too Many Pills for Seniors?
The Drug/Alcohol Combination: Are You Putting Yourself in Danger?
Although it’s well known that certain drugs can interact with each other (that’s why it’s important that health-care providers know all the medications a patient is taking), the interaction of medicine with alcohol presents an equal, if not greater, problem. According to the National Institutes of Health (NIH), many common prescription medicines can interact badly… Continue reading The Drug/Alcohol Combination: Are You Putting Yourself in Danger?
Safety Concerns About New Drugs
The authors of a study published in the August 2014 issue of Health Affairs contend that when the FDA approval process for medications changed in 1992 with the Prescription Drug User Fee Act (PDUFA), which allowed the FDA to collect fees to expedite drug approvals, the new process may have led to the release of drugs before they could be adequately evaluated for safety issues.