Syed Talat Iqbal, Zainab Batool, Sajid Mehmood.
Possible toxic effects of benzodiazepines; at therapeutic doses due to drug-drug interactions in hospitalized patients.
Professional Med J Jan ;20(2):284-9.

Introduction: Benzodiazepines and its derivatives are used widely as anxiolytics, hypnotics, seizure control and as muscle relaxants. Design: The prescriptions of 270 patients were evaluated for moderate to severe drug interactions using drug interaction detection software. Setting: Teaching hospital in Gujrat, Pakistan. Objective: This study is used to evaluate the possible toxic effects of benzodiazepine related drug-drug interactions in prescriptions of indoor patients. Material & Methods: The prescriptions were processed through a software program named, The Medical Letter Adverse Drug Interaction program. The randomly collected patient chart profiles included both male and female patients ranging from age of few months old children to old aged patients. Result:Out of 270 patients medication charts 210 medication charts were having at least one or more drug interactions ranging from moderate to severe. Out of 80 interacting drug combinations found, 15 were benzodiazepine related drug interactions. So, percentage of benzodiazepines related drug interactions was 18.75%.Moreover, the data also showed that the percentage of DDIs increases as the prescription size increases. Our results indicate that hospitalized patients in Pakistan are at risk of ADRs caused by potential DDIs. Moreover, there are chances that the safe therapeutic doses of benzodiazepines may become toxic or ineffective due to drug-drug interactions and polypharmacy. Conclusions:So, the use of DDIs detection software prograin hospitals and pharmacies should be promoted in order to minimize drugs especially benzodiazepines related injuries and to ensure patient safety

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