This month, FDA launched its revamped Recalls, Market Withdrawals, and Safety Alerts website, making it easier for consumers to search and view food and product recall information going back to 2009.
This month, FDA launched its revamped Recalls, Market Withdrawals, and Safety Alerts website, making it easier for consumers to search and view food and product recall information going back to 2009.
The new format links to the original FDA news release on each recall as well as displays the data in table form by date, product brand name, product description, reason for the recall, the recalling firm, and photos.
The new site (www.fda.gov/Safety/Recalls/default.htm), mandated by the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) signed into law in January, also provides status information on whether the recall is completed or ongoing. The status information is provided for those recalls for which FDA either ordered a mandatory recall or provided the opportunity for a voluntary recall under FDA's FSMA authority.
The site includes FDA-regulated food products, drugs, products affecting animal health, biologics, and medical devices. Information can be filtered by category, and recalled products can be sorted alphabetically by brand name or company, or by date.
“Recalls, mandatory or otherwise, are serious and we must do everything possible to make it easier for people to know about these recalls so they can take all appropriate steps to protect themselves and their families,” said Mike Taylor, FDA Deputy Commissioner for Foods. “We encourage people to check out our new recalls search page for themselves, and use it whenever they have a question about a recall.”
Coalition promotes important acetaminophen dosing reminders
November 18th 2014It may come as a surprise that each year Americans catch approximately 1 billion colds, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that as many as 20% get the flu. This cold and flu season, 7 in 10 patients will reach for an over-the-counter (OTC) medicine to treat their coughs, stuffy noses, and sniffles. It’s an important time of the year to remind patients to double check their medicine labels so they don’t double up on medicines containing acetaminophen.
Support consumer access to specialty medications through value-based insurance design
June 30th 2014The driving force behind consumer cost-sharing provisions for specialty medications is the acquisition cost and not clinical value. This appears to be true for almost all public and private health plans, says a new report from researchers at the University of Michigan Center for Value-Based Insurance Design (V-BID Center) and the National Pharmaceutical Council (NPC).
Management of antipsychotic medication polypharmacy
June 13th 2013Within our healthcare-driven society, the increase in the identification and diagnosis of mental illnesses has led to a proportional increase in the prescribing of psychotropic medications. The prevalence of mental illnesses and subsequent treatment approaches may employ monotherapy as first-line treatment, but in many cases the use of combination of therapy can occur, leading to polypharmacy.1 Polypharmacy can be defined in several ways but it generally recognized as the use of multiple medications by one patient and the most common definition is the concurrent use of five more medications. The presence of polyharmacy has the potential to contribute to non-compliance, drug-drug interactions, medication errors, adverse events, or poor quality of life.
Medical innovation improves outcomes
June 12th 2013I have been diagnosed with stage 4 cancer of the pancreas, a disease that’s long been considered not just incurable, but almost impossible to treat-a recalcitrant disease that some practitioners feel has given oncology a bad name. I was told my life would be measured in weeks.