RESUMEN
Objective: India’s pharmaceutical industry is now the third largest in the world in terms of volume. With this growth, various drugs with catchy brand names have been introduced. The potential for error due to confusing drug names amongst the healthcare personnel is significant. Numerous case reports and studies have thrown light on the confusion over similar drug names. Despite these efforts, new names that are similar to the existing names continue to be approved. Aim: The study was carried out to isolate confusing brand names, which are used currently in the Indian market and to categorize these names depending on their effect on therapeutic success. Material and methods: Recent issue of the drug formulary Indian Drug Review (IDR) (Vol. XVII Issue No. 2, March-April 2011) was referred to and all the potentially confusing brand names were analyzed. Results: Many of the brand names were similar looking (orthographic) and similar sounding (phonetic). Certain observations regarding brand naming techniques and their possible implications were noted. Conclusion: The Indian pharmaceutical industry is growing at a fast pace. Hence, India needs a competent Medication Error Reporting Program to report the brand name confusion. Also, we need to create more awareness about confusing brand names and their implications.
RESUMEN
Este artigo revisa a questão da prescrição dos medicamentos, no exercício da clínica veterinária, ressaltando as dificuldades e/ou problemas que podem resultar da existência de diversos nomes atribuídos a um mesmo fármaco. Os fármacos tem várias denominações: o nome químico, os nomes genéricos e o nome comercial. Cada fármaco pode estar presente em mais de uma especialidade farmacêutica produzida pelas diversas indústrias farmacêuticas e recebe uma denominação comercial distinta. Uma portaria ministerial aprovou as Denominações Comuns Brasileiras baseadas na terminologia recomendada pela Organização Mundial da Saúde para o nome genérico dos fármacos. mas parte da indústria farmacêutica de medicamentos de uso médico veterinário ainda não emprega a denominação recomendada em seus produtos. A multiplicidade resultante cria dificuldades e pode induzir o médico-veterinário a erros no momento da prescrição ou utilização de medicamentos além de obrigá-lo a freqüentes consultas a compêndios a procura da sinonímia mais conhecida para exercer uma terapêutica racional. Por outro lado, o intercâmbio comercial decorrente do acordo Mercosul, se incluir a comercialização de medicamentos veterinários, pode gerar dificuldades adicionais caso não sejam adotadas normas uniformes na denominação das substâncias ativas entre os países signatários do acordo.
Drugs can be designed by their chemical name, by their generic (or non proprietary) names and by the commercial (or proprietary) name. Drugs can be marketed by more than one company and can have several proprietary or trademark names. In Brazil pharmaceutical companies which produce veterinary drugs use different chemical or generic names to designe the active drug of medicines. This clearly create difficulties for veterinarians inducing errors andmisuses. Medicines for human use on the other hand have a offïcial generic (non-proprietary) name known as Denominações Comuns Brasileiras (Brazilian Common Denomination) which were adopted in accordance with the World Health Organization recomendations. It is stressed that Brazilian Oficial non-proprietary names should also be adopted by manufacturers of veterinary drugs. This would either help to eliminate the necessity for memorizing multiple chemical and generic drug names as been as reduce the possibility of misunderstanding and errors. If veterinary medicines would be marketed in various South-American countries, as a result from the Mercosul comercial agreement, the existence of many names for the same drug can result in an even more conjuse situation. This article deals with this problem and calls for attention for the uniformity of drug nomes.