Drug Safety

Drug Safety

Drug safety is a concern for many Americans, especially as we age. Prescription and over-the-counter medications can have negative reactions and cause side effects. Even if you are taking the recommended dosage of an over-the-counter medication, you need to know the active ingredients in all medications you are taking because if they share one, whether they are prescription or not, you may be taking too much of one type of drug.

Tell your health care providers about all prescription medications you are taking, including over-the-counter medications, herbs and supplements. Herbs and supplements are not approved by the FDA, and many people don’t realize that they can negatively react with other medications. For more information about drug safety, visit Medline Plus.

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    • Podcast
      CER Interview with Cynthia Bens
      August 14, 2012
      Related topics: Access to Breakthroughs    Aging Research  Drug Development  Drug Safety  Federal Funding  Health  Medical Innovation  Other Diseases of Aging  Policy  Quality of Care  Research  Vision Loss  


      Cynthia Bens is the Director of Public Policy at the not-for-profit Alliance for Aging Research in Washington, D.C. In this capacity, Ms. Bens is responsible for guiding the organization's federal policy work, representing the Alliance in multiple national coalitions, and directing the Accelerate Cure/Treatments for Alzheimer's Disease (ACT-AD) Coalition. For the past eleven years Ms. Bens has worked to inform federal policymakers and educate the public on a variety of issues. For more than half of that time her efforts have centered on the formulation of policies to expedite the development of interventions to treat and prevent many debilitating age-related disease; to remove access barriers to needed treatments and therapies; and to improve the coordination and quality of care seniors receive.


      Prior to joining the Alliance in 2006, Ms. Bens was a senior manager of government affairs with the Loeffler Group. As part of its federal government affairs practice, she represented diverse client interests before the U.S. Congress and the administration. Her core areas of focus included appropriations, budget, health care, education, telecommunications, and international trade. Through various other positions on Capitol Hill and in the private sector, she has acquired extensive experience researching and analyzing federal legislation and regulations. Ms. Bens holds a Bachelor’s of Arts degree from New York University with concentrations in Political Science and Women’s Studies. 

       

       "However, if {CER} results are poorly communicated, the availability of more information could lead to confusion for patients on what choices are the right ones for them and also confusion for providers on how they should treat their patients."

    • Podcast
      CER Interview with Gail Hunt
      August 14, 2012
      Related topics: Access to Breakthroughs    Caregiving  Drug Development  Drug Safety  Federal Funding  Medical Innovation  Policy  Quality of Care  Research  Vision Loss  

       
      Gail Hunt is President and CEO of the National Alliance for Caregiving, a non-profit coalition dedicated to conducting research and developing national programs for family caregivers and the professionals who serve them.  

      Prior to heading NAC, Ms. Hunt was President of her own aging services consulting firm for 14 years.  She conducted corporate eldercare research for the National Institute on Aging and the Social Security Administration, developed training for caregivers with AARP and the American Occupational Therapy Association, and designed a corporate eldercare program for EAPs with the Employee Assistance Professional Association. 

      She was appointed by the White House to serve on the Policy Committee for the 2005 White House Conference on Aging. Ms. Hunt was on the Advisory Panel on Medicare Education, is chair of the National Center on Senior Transportation, is a Commissioner of the Center for Aging Service Technology, and is Secretary of the Long-Term Quality Alliance.  Additionally, Ms. Hunt is on the Governing Board of the Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Institute (PCORI).
       
      "I think {CER} is a wonderful opportunity for patients and care givers to get involved in the research. Those families and care givers should be involved in helping to work on the research, involved in helping to think through what the results mean, how they can best be disseminated, and help in the dissemination. Which is an opportunity they haven’t had before."
    • Podcast
      CER Interview with David Meltzer
      August 14, 2012
      Related topics: Aging Research  Drug Development  Drug Safety  Federal Funding  Medical Innovation  Other Diseases of Aging  Policy  Prevention  Quality of Care  Research  Vision Loss  

      David O. Meltzer MD, PhD, is Chief of the Section of Hospital Medicine, Director of the Center for Health and the Social Sciences, and Chair of the Committee on Clinical and Translational Science at The University of Chicago, where he is Associate Professor in the Department of Medicine, Department of Economics and the Harris School of Public Policy Studies.  Meltzer’s research explores problems in health economics and public policy with a focus on the theoretical foundations of medical cost-effectiveness analysis and the cost and quality of hospital care. Meltzer is completing a randomized trial comparing the use of doctors who specialize in inpatient care (“hospitalists”) with traditional physicians in six academic medical centers and is Director of the AHRQ-funded Hospital Medicine and Economics Center for Education and Research in Therapeutics (CERT) at the University of Chicago.

      Meltzer received his MD and PhD in economics from the University of Chicago and completed his residency in internal medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Meltzer is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Lee Lusted Prize of the Society for Medical Decision Making, the Health Care Research Award of the National Institute for Health Care Management, and the Eugene Garfield Award from Research America. Meltzer is a research associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research, elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation, and past president of the Society for Medical Decision Making. He has served on panels examining the future of Medicare for the National Academy of Social Insurance and the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and U.S. organ allocation policy for the Institute of Medicine (IOM). He is currently serving on an IOM panel on the Learning Health Care System, the DHHS Secretary’s Advisory Committee on Healthy People 2020,and the Patient Centered Outcomes Research Institute Methodology Committee, as a Council Member of the National Institute for General Medical Studies, and as a health economics advisor for the Congressional Budget Office.

      "Off label use is common, and I think we allow it from a societal perspective because, if we limit ourselves only to things for which strong evidence exists, we will miss opportunities to do benefit."

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