Adverse Drug Events Essay

Adverse drug events affect millions of patients each year and are responsible for up to 5% of hospital admissions resulting in significant increase in costs of healthcare [1,2]. Drug-drug interactions (DDI) are important adverse drug events because they are often predictable based on previous reports, clinical studies, and an understanding of pharmacologic principles. Some adverse drug events have life-threatening consequences and may prompt the removal of popular medications from the marketplace [3-6]. DDI is defined as an increase or decrease in the clinical effect of a given drug due to interference by another drug, and is a significant cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide [7]. DDIs may result in adverse clinical events, by decreasing the therapeutic effect of a drug or by enhancing drug toxicity [8]. Combined drug intoxication is an unnatural cause of human death, and is often confused with drug overdose, but it is a completely different phenomenon. It …show more content…
The available evidence indicates that the majority of the curcumin effects are associated with its ability to suppress inflammation [16]. Experimental research during the past few decades has revealed several important pharmacological properties such as anti-inflammatory, anti-oxidant and anti-tumor activities [17]. Clinical trials performed with healthy human subjects as well as cancer patients have all demonstrated low systemic bioavailability of curcumin following oral administration, even at doses of up to 12 g/day [18,19]. However, there was no toxicity observed even at 12g/day dose. Sulforaphane (SFN) has been shown to protect against acetaminophen-induced hepatotoxicity [20], transplacental toxicity [21] and alveolar epithelial cells exposed to cigarette smoke extract [22]. However, there are no systemic sub-acute and sub-chronic toxicity studies reported in