[Evaluation of the prevalence of pathology of drug origin in a department of internal medicine].

The authors report the results of a one year study carried out in the Department of Internal Medicine at Laennec Hospital. Out of a total of 1334 hospitalisation, 95 had drug side effects (7.1 p. 100) and 3.5 p. 100 of admissions were directly related to a iatrogenic complication. These complications were more common in women and elderly patients. Sixty-two drugs were implicated: antibiotics (32.6 p. 100), cardiovascular drugs (20 p. 100) including the diuretics (8.4 p. 100), antiinflammatory and antalgic drugs (16.8 p. 100), anticoagulants (8.4 p. 100), neuropsychiatric drugs (7.4 p. 100), oral hypoglycaemic agents (6.3 p. 100)..., 101 side effects were observed: gastro-intestinal (35.6 p. 100) dermato-anaphylactic (19.8 p. 100), cardiovascular (12.9 p. 100), endocrine or metabolic (11.8 p. 100), neuropsychiatric (10.9 p. 100), haematological (5.9 p. 100) and renal (4.2 p. 100). Iatrogenic complications were responsible for the admission to hospital of 47 patients and for 390 days of hospitalisation, costing approximately 380.000 FF.