NEW Adverse Effects Checker

Natural Standard recently launched a new Adverse Effects Checker, a point-of-care resource for healthcare professionals.

Currently, dietary supplements are not approved by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) for safety and effectiveness. It is the responsibility of manufacturers and distributors to ensure products are safe before they are marketed to the public. Manufacturers have been required to report all serious product-related adverse effects to the FDA since December of 2007.

This decision-support tool allows clinicians to quickly search for potential causes of reported adverse effects alphabetically or by category. Users can click on specific adverse effects (such as abdominal cramps or hair loss) to see which integrative therapies may have these effects. The checker results are based on evidence from laboratory and animal studies, human case reports and trials, as well as expert opinion and anecdote.

Natural Standard has also added a Case Report button, which allows users to easily submit case reports for integration into Natural Standard monographs and submission to the FDA.

Natural Standard's evidence-based systematic reviews have always featured potential adverse effects of integrative therapies. The new Adverse Effects Checker conveniently compiles this information in one location for easy use.

To try this new tool, please visit Natural Standard's NEW Adverse Effects Checker.

 

Comments

[SB]

What a wonderful tool for the public to use. So many people know so little about what they are taking and are at the mercy of the manufacturers. Great idea.

[ks]

I just checked out this tool, very useful! This makes it very easy for patients to enter in their side effects and easily determine if it is caused by anything they are currently taking. Herbs and supplements are often associated with many different side effects, and this is a simple tool for consumers to use to see whether or not their symptoms are related to a specific product.

[nb]

I agree with EM. I am somewhat hesitant to use many natural supplements as their safety and effectiveness are not regulated by the FDA and it is reported voluntarily by the manufacturers. The Case Report feature allows consumers to become a part of evidence-based medicine and eventually increase the quality of natural herbals and supplements.

[sz]

I found this tool to be really great and easy to use. There are a lot of different ways to phrase things, so I found that instead of look for a symptom by clicking the letter, I used "command f" to search the webpage for the word I was looking for. For example, I couldn't find dandruff under "d", but I was able to find "dry, itchy scalp" by searching for "scalp".

[NA]

This Adverse Effects Checker is a great idea! With all the different types of natural products, it can be challenging to keep track of all the interactions or side effects they may cause. This Adverse Effects Checker can quickly provide information to a variety of health care providers, and hopefully help patients use their CAM products more safely. The other types of checkers available on the Natural Standard database may also be helpful. I tried it out and this new tool is very easy to use!

[CC]

The Adverse Effects checker is so convenient. I just used it to look up the adverse effect of acne since many of my female patients complain of increased breakouts during the summer months. The checker found that zinc can increase acne. This is going to be a great resource to help answer patient questions!

[CHD]

I think this is another good step toward gathering more evidence for the more prevalent natural medications. It seems like a great tool for gathering case reports from more sources to support safe and responsible use of natural remedies. I agree with DC. I will be using this feature often in the future.

[DC]

This is great. We can now use this tool to quickly help us make good decisions about OTC/herbs etc. I like how we can sort through several categories especially brand name products to which it can be hard to remember the active ingredient(s)immediately.
Herbs / Supplements
Brand Name Products
Generic Drugs / OTCs
Brand Name Drugs

[Scooby]

To follow the trend here, I will also mention, that the Case Report feature is a great way for clinicians to share current clinical situations involving integrative medicines. Moreover, with the growth and expansion of alternative medicines and dietary supplements amongst health-systems, as well as the general public, the potential for adverse effects arise, just as they do for conventional medicines. To have a database that provides easy access to evidence-based, expert opinionated information further promotes the optimization of healthcare. I recommend Natural Standard's Adverse Effects Checker for all healthcare professionals as a part of their repertoire of databases. This would be even better if it had a smartphone and iPad app.

[UP]

This adverse event checker for herbal medications is great! I have heard stories from practitioners about the how patients didn’t list herbals on their medications taking list. The patients then ended up being in the hospital for days due to adverse effects to an herbal medication such as bleeding, but no one had a clue to what caused the problem because the herbal was never mentioned on admission. It would be good to see how many practitioners use it to see if symptoms could be associated with herbals that people fail to mention.

[FR]

This is a great addition to the website. The way the adverse effects checker is set up, may be especially helpful for individuals who are taking multiple supplements because they can enter in the side effect they are experiencing and see which supplements cause that particular adverse effect. It may be a nice way to narrow down what effects are from each supplement.

[MN]

This is such a great idea! I already love that there is a interactions checker available to readily check for interactions between traditional medications and alternative medications. Having a Case Report feature is an added bonus for patients who question about other rare side effects.

[DD]

Both the Adverse Effects Checker and the Case Report Button are great safety tools for consumers and professionals! After a quick glance at the Adverse Effects Checker, I know I definitely will be using it in the future. The best part of this tool is that you can check off multiple symptoms and the results will highlight if there is evidence for a specific supplement that causes both or only one of the symptoms. As for the Case Report Button, this is a great way for the FDA to get patient reports and use it to benefit others.

[KS]

I think the case report tool is such a great idea. The FDA gets important information from post-marketing surveillance, but in order to be able to derive useful information from consumer cases, they need to actually receive reports from as many patients as possible. Beyond the public service that this will be providing by increasing the FDA's awareness of safety and efficacy for different products on the market, this will definitely be a wealth of information for Natural Standard to incorporate into monographs.

[Charles]

The Case Report feature is a great idea. It would be a hard task to catalog all of the adverse effects of a certain treatment given the biological variability across humans. This has to be really helpful for the regulatory agencies.

[JR]

This is great! The feature to add case reports regarding adverse effects from dietary supplements and herbals is especially valuable. This will allow for even more information to be available for the benefit of increased patient safety.

[MM]

This is very exciting for Natural Standard. Since so many people use products that aren't regulated by the FDA for safety and effectiveness, it is important for the consumers to be able to communicate with one another, especially concerning adverse effects. It will also be a great tool for clinicians to use to help incorporate alternative medicine into their practice.

[DC]

This new checker will be helpful for healthcare practitioners and the general public a like. It can be hard to figure out what could be causing a new symptom. This feature allows searching by symptom to help determine if a symptom could be caused by an alternative medicine. It’s also helpful in ruling out the alternative medicine. I will definitely be using this feature in the future.

[EM]

The Case Report feature is such a great idea! I love how it allows users to provide personal input from their experiences to improve existing monographs. This is yet another way that Natural Standard is providing the most comprehensive and up to date information on these therapies.