The Safe Patient Project is a Consumers Union campaign focused on eliminating medical harm, improving FDA oversight of prescription drugs and promoting disclosure laws that give information to consumers about health care safety and quality.
Pharma
Multistate Meningitis Outbreak Investigation
A steroid injection from one compounding plant in MA are tainted with Fungle Meningitis.
Categories: Medical Devices & Drugs
Tags: CDC, FDA, Pharma
Ouch! Hospital to review woman’s $83,046 scorpion sting bill
$39,652 per dose for two shots of scorpion anti-venom! There is a cure but can you afford it?
Categories: Medical Devices & Drugs
Tags: drug costs, Pharma
Big Pharma’s Big Fines
Chart of unbelievably large fines paid by large pharmaceutical companies.
Categories: Doctor Accountability
Tags: FDA, Pharma
Let’s talk about labels
A bill in California (SB 1390) would create a minimum of 12-point font for the most crucial information on medication labels and would require translation of medication label information into commonly used non-English languages.
Categories: Medical Devices & Drugs
Tags: C. diff, ICU, medication labels, Patient Safety Day, Pharma
California Pharmacy Board Should Support Safer Medication Labels
Guest blog post written by Syed Sayeed, Policy Analyst at Consumers Union’s West Coast Office. CU is calling on California residents to submit comments to the Pharmacy Board by March 10th, in support of requiring all pharmacies to print important label information in at least a 12-point font size.
Categories: Medical Devices & Drugs
Tags: C. diff, CDC, ICU, medicare part d, medication labels, Pharma
Medical Mistakes show on Oprah
Did you catch the Oprah Winfrey Show on Tuesday about medical mistakes? She featured actor Dennis Quaid who recalled the series of hospital errors that nearly killed his newborn twins after they were given one thousand times the amount of the blood-thinning drug Heparin—twice.
Categories: Hospital Acquired Infections, Medical Devices & Drugs, Medical Errors
Tags: Patient Safety Day, Pharma, recall
You Score Higher Marks than Doctors
According to new FDA data, consumers like you make up the majority of drug adverse event reports submitted, replacing physicians.
Categories: Medical Devices & Drugs, Medical Errors
Tags: FDA, Pharma
Common sense shouldn’t take two years – unless it’s the FDA
Should it really take two years to study a common-sense proposal to make drug ads better for consumers? Not unless it’s the Food and Drug Administration, which has taken foot-dragging to new heights
Categories: Doctor Accountability, Medical Devices & Drugs
Tags: FDA, Pharma, public reporting
What Vytorin/Zetia Ads Don’t Tell You
Last Sunday a panel of cardiologists told more than 5,000 people that high cholesterol patients shouldn’t take Vytorin and Zetia except as a last resort. Made by Merck and Schering-Plough, these widely prescribed cholesterol-lowering drugs are taken by about four million Americans.
Categories: Medical Devices & Drugs
Tags: FDA, flu, Pharma, Vytorin
FDA Gets Moving on TV Drug Ad Study – Thanks to You
Can one person take on the monolithic FDA and get it to actually do something about drug safety? You bet – especially when that person is backed by 56,000 voices.
Categories: Medical Devices & Drugs
Tags: FDA, Pharma
