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The website www.palliativedrugs.com has provided essential independent information about drugs used in palliative and hospice care since 2000, and has over 37000 members from 153 countries. It contains the on-line Palliative Care Formulary (PCF) and provides free access to a Bulletin board to stimulate questions and share experiences, a Document library containing 475 items of useful information and a Syringe Driver Survey Database containing details of over 2350 different drug combinations. The UK Palliative Care Formulary 6th edition (book, and on-line version) and Introducing Palliative Care 5th edition can also be purchased via the website. This feature provides a selection of items that have featured in the News and Latest additions sections in recent months; for additional information, please register for free on the website.
Safety updates
Drug name confusion
UK Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) has highlighted the risk of confusion between similar sounding or similar looking drug names. This follows more reports, including cases with fatal outcomes, of confusion between similarly named or sounding brand or generic names. Examples include clobazam and clonazepam; risperidone and ropinirole.
Patient safety alert: Oxygen cylinders
UK NHS improvement has issued a patient safety alert highlighting the risk of death and severe harm from failure to obtain and continue flow from oxygen cylinders. The recent introduction of integral valves, as a fire safety precaution, has had the unintended consequence of staff believing oxygen is flowing when it is not, and/or unable to turn the oxygen flow on in an emergency.