ASHP Featured in US News & World Report Story on Pain Meds

7/24/2009

Cynthia Reilly, director of the ASHP practice development division, was quoted in a US News & World Report article about pain medications.

Reilly's quote is copied below:

Cynthia Reilly, director of the practice development division at the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists, says the organization was disappointed that the FDA did not pull propoxyphene from the market. "We testified, calling for market withdrawal [because of] safety concerns with propoxyphene," she says. "Considering the number of other options, and considering the safety and effectiveness concerns, we would've hoped that it would've been withdrawn from the market."

In prepared written testimony for a statement given before the FDA in January, Reilly cited research that she says demonstrates that propoxyphene has a poor record of effectiveness. Among the research she cited was a meta-analysis of 26 studies involving 2,231 patients who had postoperative, arthritis, or musculoskeletal pain that compared the effectiveness of acetaminophen plus propoxyphene and the effectiveness of acetaminophen taken alone or with a placebo. The findings showed that adding propoxyphene was no more effective than taking acetaminophen alone. Another study she cited involved patients with moderate to severe postoperative pain; it found that a propoxyphene-acetaminophen combination was about as effective as another pain medication called tramadol but was less effective than ibuprofen.