Generic drugs online

Points for Consideration by the Physician

• This fulfills your voluntary obligation to Phase Four reporting and makes medication use safer for evervone. I admit that I am the one advocating mandatory reporting for everyone, not just the people who make the medicines. Encourage the patient to call as needed regarding any aspect of drug treatment. Recognize the need to adjust drug selection and/or dosage regimens to accommodate individual variability.
• Give special attention to the older patient on drug therapy. The elderly (1) generally use multiple drugs concurrently, and (2) are more prone to experience adverse drug effects. If you refer any of your patients to a specialist, be certain to take a repeat medication history when they are returned to your care. Check for duplications in medicines by cross-referencing brand or generic names.
• Every six months, ask your patients to bring in all the prescription, nonprescription, and herbal medicines that they routinely take. This kind of "brown bag session" can help you best understand all of the potential or actual interactions of therapies your patient is or will be taking. Remember: An informed patient can be your greatest ally in optimal therapeutics and the outcomes that will be benchmarked!

Suggestions for Containing the Costs of Drug Therapy

• When you have selected the most appropriate drug, consider its cost. If the patient requests an available generic product, direct the pharmacist to dispense one with certified bioequivalence. Because of generic product variability, caution the patient to have the prescription refilled with the identical generic (same manufacturer) each time.
• Avoid polypharmacy whenever possible. Limit the number of drugs that the patient is taking concurrently to the fewest required. Do not let the cure become the disease. Medicate serious, significant disorders; discourage the use of drugs for minor, transient complaints. Consider carefully any requests from patients for a prescription drug they have learned about through direct-to-consumer advertising. Explain to your patients the profit motive of the producer and assure them that you will prescribe the drug that, in your judgment, is the most appropriate one for them.
• When circumstances permit, use home intravenous drug therapy in preference to hospitalization.
• The move toward managed care and other health care reform initiatives brings increased scrutiny to the outcomes of your therapeutic and clinical decisions. Become more familiar with the expense of various medicinal options, as well as the specific patient populations where the benefit-to-risk and cost-to-outcome ratios make the most sense. Pharmacoeconomic and disease management approaches will bring the best balance of cost and outcome.