For Some Soldiers, Powerful Drug Cocktails Have Deadly Results
Soldiers may be in danger, not from the enemy, but from their own medications.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/13/us/13drugs.html?_r=1&hpw
The tragic deaths described in these stories seem largely avoidable, given what we know about drug interactions, pharmacogenetics and the DNA testing and software tools we have for managing complex medication regimens. Many of the drug interaction described in this article are well- known. Many more will be predicted only by GeneMedRx. Physicians are also generally unaware of the extent to which these interactions can be made more severe or treatment can fail according to DNA status of the CYPs for which they can order testing. It’s frustrating that medical practice is so slow to use the knowledge and tools available to solve these problems, but every year, and now it seems like every month, we get closer. I’m sending an email to the reporters who did this story to see if I can get the exact med regimens of these soldiers so we can put them into GeneMedRx and provide the reports to some of the individuals quoted in this story in the hope that we can help solve this problem.
- Howard Coleman, Genelex CEO