Case reports of suspected adverse drug reactions--systematic literature survey of follow-up.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

To determine whether anecdotal reports of suspected adverse drug reactions are valuable early warning signals.

Design

Systematic literature survey

Data sources

We evaluated all case reports of adverse drug reactions published in 1997 in five medical journals. Reports were excluded if the adverse reaction had previously been described in earlier publications and was already listed in the product information of the drug reference source (the British National Formulary (BNF) or the Medicines Compendium). We used the Web of Knowledge Citation Index and Medline for 2003 to identify follow-up studies.

Main outcome measures

Primary: the number of suspected adverse reactions subjected to formal validation studies and the findings of these studies. Secondary:

SUBMITTER: Loke YK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1363912 | biostudies-literature | 2006 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature