scholarly journals A comparison of national essential medicines lists in the Americas

2020 ◽  
Vol 44 ◽  
pp. 1
Author(s):  
Liane Steiner ◽  
Darshanand Maraj ◽  
Hannah Woods ◽  
Jordan Jarvis ◽  
Hannah Yaphe ◽  
...  

Objectives. To compare national essential medicines lists (NEMLs) from countries in the Region of the Americas and to identify potential opportunities for improving those lists. Methods. In June of 2017, NEMLs from 31 countries in the Americas were abstracted from documents included in a World Health Organization (WHO) repository. The lists from the Americas were compared to each other and to NEMLs from outside of the Americas, as well as with the WHO Model List of Essential Medicines, 20th edition (“WHO Model List”) and the list of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) Regional Revolving Fund for Strategic Public Health Supplies (“Strategic Fund”). Results. The number of differences between the NEMLs from the Americas and the WHO Model List were similar within those countries (median: 295; interquartile range (IQR): 265 to 347). The NEMLs from the Americas were generally similar to each other. While the NEMLs from the Americas coincided well with the Strategic Fund list, some medicines were not included on any of those NEMLs. All the NEMLs in the Americas included some medicines that were withdrawn due to adverse effects by a national regulatory body (median: 8 withdrawn medicines per NEML; IQR: 4 to 12). Conclusions. The NEMLs in the Americas were fairly similar to each other and to the WHO Model List and the Strategic Fund list. However, some areas of treatment and some specific medicines were identified that the countries should reassess when revising their NEMLs.

Pain ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 156 (5) ◽  
pp. 793-797 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter R. Kamerman ◽  
Antonia L. Wadley ◽  
Karen D. Davis ◽  
Aki Hietaharju ◽  
Parmanand Jain ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Maithili Pramod Joshi ◽  
Ameya Chaudhari ◽  
Prashant S. Kharkar ◽  
Shreerang V. Joshi

: Historically, the use of Iodinated Contrast Media (ICM) for diagnostic purposes, particularly radiography and computed tomography (CT), is well-known. Many of the ICM are included in the World Health Organization (WHO)’s List of Essential Medicines. Depending on the chemotype and the presence of ionizable functional group(s), the ICM are categorized in the ionic/nonionic monomers/dimers. The lipophilicity, aqueous solubility, viscosity and osmolality are major characteristics dictating their use for one procedure versus the other. Over last several decades, substantial advancement occurred in the design and development of novel ICM, solely to reduce their propensity to cause adverse effects. Given the nature of their acute usage, some of the agents with appreciable toxicity are still used. Understanding their chemistry aspects is crucial to appreciate, acknowledge and justify the usage of these extremely important torch-bearers of diagnostic agent’s class. The present review article presents an in-depth overview of the synthetic methods, therapeutic indications, potential adverse effects along with the commercial and environmental aspects of ICM. The safety and tolerability of these agents is a field that has gained significant importance, which is given due importance in the discussion.


2013 ◽  
Vol 89 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-178
Author(s):  
Helena Lutéscia L. Coelho ◽  
Luís Carlos Rey ◽  
Marina S.G. de Medeiros ◽  
Ronaldo A. Barbosa ◽  
Said G. da Cruz Fonseca ◽  
...  

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sarah Kreps

BACKGROUND Misinformation about COVID-19 has presented challenges to public health authorities during pandemics. Understanding the prevalence and type of misinformation across contexts offers a way to understand the discourse around COVID-19 while informing potential countermeasures. OBJECTIVE The aim of the study was to study COVID-19 content on two prominent microblogging platform, Twitter, based in the United States, and Sina Weibo, based in China, and compare the content and relative prevalence of misinformation to better understand public discourse of public health issues across social media and cultural contexts. METHODS A total of 3,579,575 posts were scraped from both Weibo and Twitter, focusing on content from January 30th, 2020, when the World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 a “Public Health Emergency of International Concern” and February 6th, 2020. A 1% random sample of tweets that contained both the English keywords “coronavirus” and “covid-19” and the equivalent Chinese characters was extracted and analyzed based on changes in the frequencies of keywords and hashtags. Misinformation on each platform was compared by manually coding and comparing posts using the World Health Organization fact-check page to adjudicate accuracy of content. RESULTS Both platforms posted about the outbreak and transmission but posts on Sina Weibo were less likely to reference controversial topics such as the World Health Organization and death and more likely to cite themes of resisting, fighting, and cheering against the coronavirus. Misinformation constituted 1.1% of Twitter content and 0.3% of Weibo content. CONCLUSIONS Quantitative and qualitative analysis of content on both platforms points to cross-platform differences in public discourse surrounding the pandemic and informs potential countermeasures for online misinformation.


1993 ◽  
Vol 162 (4) ◽  
pp. 447-451 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gavin Andrews

Psychiatry is becoming increasingly confident about defining the benefits to be expected from each treatment (World Health Organization, 1991). The World Health Organization has published a list of essential drug treatments, but neither it nor any national regulatory body has ever examined non-drug treatments. This article examines the utility of the psychotherapies as treatments for persons with psychiatric disorders, and within a health service, whether supported by private insurance or by public taxation. It is not about the utility of psychotherapy paid for by an individual, for what people do with their own money is their own business. However, when deciding how to apportion a limited health budget, one should choose treatments that are more effective, safer, and cheaper than competing alternatives. Precisely how effectiveness, safety, and cost efficiency should be traded off against each other is a moot point, but there is agreement that treatments that are ineffective, harmful, and costly should not be used.


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