Prescription drugs, brand name vs generic

[Katniss88]

While I was working the other day one of my patients had an allergy to tylox, a name I have never heard of. I looked it up and was surprised to see it was oxycodone-acetaminophen, and percocet was on the emar. So I got to thinking, why is it that we have to use both names it can be come very confusing. I'm not a pharmacist, there can be three or more brand names for one type of drug, how can we keep up with all these names. I know the hospital pharmacy makes sure that any medications the patient has an allergy to doesn't end up on the emar. I was thinking that hospitals should refer to medications using one name and also for the allergy list.

[PacoUSA, BSN, RN]

I hear you! I hated pharmacology for that one reason alone. Fortunately, our exam would have both generic and brand names listed.

But anyway, as much as I hate dealing with brand and generic names, we have to kind of live with it, this is not going to change anytime soon. There are always going to be several brand names for one generic out there (think Benadryl and Zzzquil are the same thing -- diphenhydramine. Acetaminophen is also Tylenol and something I just saw the other day at a marathon called Un-Aspirin lol ) ... so the best thing that hospitals can do is list both brand and generic names on eMARs. Unless this compliance is done, we are in for frustrating times. I used to work at a hospital where eMARs were constantly littered with meds that were either generic name or brand name, but never only one or the other. It was frustrating.

[mhy12784]

While I was working the other day one of my patients had an allergy to tylox, a name I have never heard of. I looked it up and was surprised to see it was oxycodone-acetaminophen, and percocet was on the emar. So I got to thinking, why is it that we have to use both names it can be come very confusing. I'm not a pharmacist, there can be three or more brand names for one type of drug, how can we keep up with all these names. I know the hospital pharmacy makes sure that any medications the patient has an allergy to doesn't end up on the emar. I was thinking that hospitals should refer to medications using one name and also for the allergy list.

But if hospitals refer to everything as one name, what about patients ?

Theyre all going to come in only knowing brand names

[Tenebrae, BSN, RN]

Not to mention the different names in different countries. For example acetaminophen is called paracetamol in NZ.

I think how it works is there is a brand name, a generic name and a chemical name

[KelRN215, BSN, RN]

But if hospitals refer to everything as one name, what about patients ?

Theyre all going to come in only knowing brand names

This is true. When I worked in the hospital, generic names were preferred but most patients knew the brand names of their drugs. If you asked a parent "what dose of Phenytoin does your child take?" the response would probably be "he's not on that med" and then further down in the medical history they'd say "he takes 2 pills of Dilantin."