Are your prescriptions making you feel worse?
It has become increasingly clear that we each need to be our own health care advocate to the best of our ability. In this time of specialization, your general practitioner might not know what medications other doctors are prescribing for you. Potentially dangerous drug interactions and side effects are a real possibility, as we learned with my father-in-law a few years ago.
While most side-effects are included in the packaging of most prescriptions, the list isn’t always complete. Drug trials might not have been large enough to include every possible negative reaction to another drug, or to your body.
Here are some apps that can help inform you of possible bad interactions and unusual side effects that you should alert your doctors to. We encourage you to first alert your doctor if you have started a new medication and are not feeling well before you dive into internet research.
On Pocket Pharmacist you will get speedy answers to a drug search and unbiased information (no ads or plugs for specific medications). Users can run interaction checks and learn about interactions, overlapping precautions and side effects. It provides a well-researched drug study guide. For example, taking an SSRI antidepressant with some types of cough medication can cause shivering and jitters. The app is constantly being updated.
For Apple
Drugs.com is a comprehensive app that allows users to check drug interactions and side effects, identify pills, check for any FDA alerts, and access a complete A – Z drug information database.
Drug Search app is a user friendly and intuitive mobile app. Use it to manage medications, search for different drugs, check interactions, and more.
Available for Google.
My Rx Profile app is a medical interaction checker app. It encourages users to check their prescriptions with their other medications prior to filling them. Add your prescriptions and over the counter (OTC) medications into your profile. When you are considering an OTC supplement or have a new prescription this app quickly identifies it and alerts you of any negative drug interactions. You can also easily email a copy of your profile to go into your Primary Care Physician’s file through this app. This app also allows you to create profiles for anyone in your family and check drug interactions for them.
It is available for both iOS and Google.
