My husband has numerous medical
problems for which he swallows of cocktail of pills morning and evening – and a
few at lunchtime. From time to time the
doctor or consultant will prescribe something new to cope with a new
problem. Are all these drugs themselves
the problem? The latest pill, prescribed
by a consultant, was difficult to get hold of, but we finally got it. Thankfully, we read the accompanying
literature before swallowing one of the pills – they are contra-indicated for
anyone suffering from a particular condition which my husband has, or anyone
undergoing surgery in the near future (my husband had a small op due in a few
weeks) or recent past.
When we took the leaflet and pills
to the consultant doing the operation,
he was very firm that those particular pills should not be taken. When we spoke to the consultant who gave the
prescription he thought the other consultant was being over-fussy and he was sure
that it would not cause any problems.
Do the different doctors know what
they are prescribing? Do they understand
what they are prescribing for? Although
they all have his notes on their computer screens, and/or in a very thick
folder on the desk, do they even look at anything but their own
paragraphs? Does anyone look at the
broader picture? It’s scary to think of
what might have happened if we had not removed that leaflet from the pill pack
and read it all.
All this prompted me to research
into the drugs that were coming into our home, by reading packet leaflets,
going to the manufacturers websites, and exploring a number of different health
and doctoring websites in UK and USA.
The results of that set me on a process to get a “drug review”. The pharmacist said he could tell us what the
drugs were for, but no more. I already
knew that. The doctor said he wouldn’t
interfere with prescriptions issued by consultants. Various other health admin professionals
didn’t know why I wanted to question anything, and others didn’t know what a
drug review was! Eventually I got some
clues to follow, and after many phone calls I found someone who understood and
told me who should be able to arrange it.
Three months after I started the
research we had a meeting with a hospital doctor whose job is to look at
everything relating to a patient – medication, history, life-style, diet,
disabilities and abilities, speech, thoughts and so on. He praised my research, explained to both of
us the purpose of the drugs and agreed that some of them were in conflict with
others. As a result he has dropped one
drug completely, dropped another temporarily to test reactions, and reduced the
dose of another.
Success!
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