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Peter A. G. M. De Smet, PharmD, PhD; for the HARM-Wrestling Group

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

The investigation by Leendertse et al¹ confirms earlier findings that many hospital admissions related to medications (HARMs) are potentially preventable and that a substantial portion of them involve a handful of long-existing drug classes with pharmacologically predictable effects. The important implication is that clinical risk management should focus not only on new risks of new drugs but also on certain old risks of old drugs. This prompted the setup of an expert "HARM-Wrestling" Group, which has recently presented specific advice concerning 7 categories of adverse effects (ie, hemorrhage, electrolyte disturbances, fractures, disturbances of diabetic control, renal insufficiency and heart failure, constipation, and bradycardia).²

Roughly speaking, half of the advice is about appropriate prescribing (eg, giving drugs only on strict indication or adding a protective drug), a quarter is about careful follow-up (eg, laboratory monitoring and appropriate duration of . . . [Full Text of this Article]

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RELATED LETTER

Hospital Admissions Related to Medications and Implementing Guidelines—Reply
Patricia M. L. A. van den Bemt, Anne J. Leendertse, Lennart J. Stoker, and Antoine C. G. Egberts
Arch Intern Med. 2009;169(8):811.
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