Canada Offers Database of Adverse Drug Reactions

Canada has begun offering a database of reported adverse drug reactions, which you can access at http://hc-sc.gc.ca/hpfb-dgpsa/tpd-dpt/cadrmp-pcseim/index_e.html . The site describes the materia tracked in the site this way: "Canadian marketed health products of pharmaceuticals, biologics (including blood products and therapeutic and diagnostic vaccines), natural health products, and radiopharmaceuticals." I suspect there's more to it than that -- I saw peanut butter on the list of products -- but this'll get you started.

You can actually either search the files or download files, so you'll have to read an agreement letter and decide which you want to do. I'm going to do plain search. I can search by date reported data was received (it goes from 1965 - 2005, with the promise that the data will be updated quarterly), product search or active ingredient search, how the product was involved (in the course of treatment, interacting with food or alcohol, etc.), the age of the patient, the gender of the patient, and the outcome (death, recovery with or without sequelae, etc.)

(Sequelae: A pathological condition resulting from a disease. ala http://www.answers.com/sequelae&r=67 , and now you have your vocabulary word for the day.)

I did a search for Synthroid, all dates, all ages, all genders, all outcomes. I got 1398 results. Results are presented in a table containing report ID, date received, product name, product involvement, outcome, age, and gender. Click on the report ID and you'll get some additional information, including weight and height of patient (sometimes), whether or not the reaction was serious, other drugs the patient was taking, and dosage amount and frequency of the drug (sometimes this is not included.) There's also a list of the adverse reactions reported, and who provided notification of the reaction.

Posted to Science-Medicine-Drugs | TrackBack