Medications subject to controlled substances laws can pose a risk to human health. They are only available when recommended by a prescribing physician and administered by licensed medical professionals, such as pharmacists or nurses at a care facility. Those professionals set the dosage and should monitor the patient’s response to medication to adjust treatment as necessary to minimize the danger to the patient.
Prescribed medications might be dangerous for several different reasons. In some cases, drugs are a safety concern because they have a very low overdose threshold. Other times, the main concern might be how addictive the medication can become. Patients may have a hard time terminating their use of the medication. Many medications are also dangerous specifically because they could affect other necessary drugs. Drug interactions can trigger major medical issues for a patient.
Medication errors made in medical settings can be a safety concern because they can reduce the efficacy of treatment and put someone at increased risk of an adverse reaction to a medication that they should not have taken. Sometimes, when doctors make mistakes prescribing drugs, nurses make mistakes when administering drugs or when pharmacists dispense the wrong medication, those errors might lead to a dangerous interaction between one medication that someone should take and the drug that they received due to a medical mistake.
Drug interactions can threaten someone’s health
There are many different types of interactions that can occur when a patient takes more than one medication at a time. Some drugs have synergistic effects on each other. That essentially means that one drug increases the effects of another medication.
Other times, one medication might nullify another, reducing or eliminating its positive impact on the body. Any of these scenarios could be a major safety concern for patients who require medication for their health. Someone’s response to treatment might be sub-optimal because they experienced an interaction that reduced the efficacy of a medication. Other times, the side effects of the drug interaction could endanger someone’s health.
Unfortunately, medical professionals may not be especially forthcoming when they make mistakes that put people at risk. A mistake caused by distraction or fatigue could result in dire medical implications for the patient involved. Filing a medical malpractice lawsuit could be an appropriate reaction to a professional medication error that triggered a debilitating drug interaction.
