According to a McGill pharmacologist, many members of the medical profession in North America are guilty of drug abuse; they are ignorant of the dose requirements and side effects of the drugs they prescribe. Most drugs that have been on the market more than ten years have never been properly tested; research has revealed that these are being used in an arbitrary fashion, sometimes with tragic results. Little or no information exists on the blood concentrations required for these drugs to have optimal therapeutic effect. Surveys on adverse drug reaction carried out at the Montreal General Hospital have exposed a group of commonly abused drugs, widely prescribed for a variety of complaints, including heart failure, diabetes, and kidney disease. Researchers have drawn up new dosing schedules that take into account previously ignored factors like body weight and disease complications, and have achieved a dramatic change in previously alarming statistics.
