“Please prescribe some good medicine”, “Is there any  imported ones?” “Prescribe me most expensive medicine!” … in the hospital, patients or their relatives always ask these questions whenever doctor prescribes medicines. In fact, you should tell doctor following things instead:    

1. If you were sensitive or have abnormal reaction to some medicines or substances, you should tell doctor, because anaphylaxis caused by medicine will lead to itch, rash, and even anaphylactic shock and death.   

2. Other diseases, especially liver and kidney-related disease   Liver and kidney are two important organs for metabolism, some medicines has severe effect on liver and kidney and will have adverse effect on those with poor kidney function. Diabetic patients should avoid taking medicines with high sugar content. If you tell doctor these conditions, doctor will adjust dose and interval of medicine or even prescribe other medicine instead.            

3. Pregnant, prepare for pregnancy or during lactation       Quite a few clinical medicines are prohibited for pregnant women. Since 1982, safety research report of pregnancy-use drug is required for all drugs sold on the market, in accordance with safety, medicines used for pregnant woman are classified into five classes-A, B, C, D and X, the safety decreases gradually, namely A is the safest, and X is prohibited for pregnant women. Some medicines secreted from mother's body will flow into latex, so you should avoid using them during lactation.          

4. Take other medicines at the same time or within last two months   In order to avoid interaction of different medicines, before doctor’s prescription, it is necessary for you to tell doctor your current medicine use conditions and bring them to doctor if necessary. It is common phenomenon on the market that one machine with many different names, you may take two different medicine with same content. Redundant use of medicine is dangerous and may cause toxic reaction.       

5. Special conditions of occupation   The prescription given by doctor is usually for common patients, for those who work in special conditions, it is necessary for doctor to give prescription according to their special conditions of occupation. The typical group in this regard is driver and high-altitude operation personnel, for them the medicine with drowsiness effect is prohibited to avoid potential dangers. Moreover, some conditions, although seldom seen, should be paid attention, e.g. professional athletes should be prudent for the use of anti-influenza medicine, so as to avoid taking prohibited drug by mistake.          

Wuhan Food and Drug Administration  Luo Zhi