HEALTH TIPS - Monday, April 3, 2000 "News That Keeps You Healthy" MANY PATIENTS REACT ADVERSELY TO DRUGS A study shows 50 percent of patients questioned have suffered an adverse reaction to therapeutic drugs. Scientists from the Louisiana State University and PharMerica at Touro Infirmary in New Orleans found the reactions included unwanted side effects and allergic responses. This problem has been well publicized in the hospital setting, but the new research focused on patients visiting a retail pharmacy in Louisiana. Of the 103 volunteers questioned, 50.5 percent said they had 70 unwanted drug events sometime during their lives -- nearly all of them in the outpatient setting. Only 19 percent of the adverse reactions occurred in a hospital. Patients reported 11 percent of these unwanted events as being life-threatening. As a result, 14 percent of them sought care in the hospital emergency room, and 2 percent required hospitalization. Another 55 percent of patients either visited or called their health care provider for advice, said principal study investigator Gamal Hussein. "Because more than half of the adverse events occurred after patients took the first doses of their drugs, a phone call by the pharmacist to each patient within 24 hours after receiving a new prescription should help detect any early signs of problems," Hussein said.