AimsTo determine the cost savings of pharmacist initiated changes to hospitalized patients' drug therapy or management in eight major acute care government funded teaching hospitals in Australia. MethodsThis was a prospective study performed in eight hospitals examining resource implications of pharmacists' interventions assessed by an independent clinical panel. Pharmacists providing clinical services to inpatients recorded details of interventions, defined as any action that directly resulted in a change to patient management or therapy. An independent clinical review panel, convened at each par ticipating centre, confirmed or rejected the clinical pharmacist's assessment of the impact on leng th of stay (LOS), readmission probability, medical procedures and laboratory monitoring and quantified the resultant changes, which were then costed. ResultsA total of 1399 interventions were documented. Eight hundred and thir ty-five interventions impacted on drug costs alone. Five hundred and eleven interventions were evaluated by the independent panels with three quarters of these confirmed as having an impact on one or more of: length of stay, readmission probability, medical procedures or laboratory monitoring. There were 96 interventions deemed by the independent panels to have reduced LOS and 156 reduced the potential for readmission. The calculated savings was $263 221 for the eight hospitals during the period of the study. This included $150 307 for length of stay reduction, $111 848 for readmission reduction. ConclusionsThe annualized cost savings relating to length of stay, readmission, drugs, medical procedures and laboratory monitoring as a result of clinical pharmacist initiated changes to hospitalized patient management or therapy was $4 444 794 for eight major acute care government funded teaching hospitals in Australia.M. J. Dooley et al. 51457 :4 Br J Clin Pharmacol

How safe and effective are antidepressants in children and adolescents? The authors of this review have found disturbing shortcomings in the methods and reporting of trials of newer antidepressants in this patient group Antidepressants introduced since 1990, especially selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors and venlafaxine, have been used increasingly as first line treatment for depression in children. 1 2 The safety of prescribing antidepressants to children (including adolescents) has been the subject of increasing concern in the community and the medical profession, leading to recommendations against their use from government and industry (box 1). In this paper, we review the published literature on the efficacy and safety of newer antidepressants in children. MethodsHaving criticised the way in which Keller et al interpreted the results of their study, 3 4 we sought to check the quality of methods and reporting of other published trials of newer antidepressants in children (box 2). Of seven published randomised controlled trials of newer antidepressants for depressed children published in refereed journals, six used a placebo control. 3 5-9 We analysed each study's methods and the extent to which authors' conclusions were supported by data. The seventh study, which compared a newer antidepressant with a tricyclic antidepressant without finding significant difference, 10 was not included in the analysis but appears in the table on bmj.com.

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Evidence from human studies in vivo and in vitro strongly suggests that the methylhydroxylation of tolbutamide and the 4-hydroxylation of phenytoin, the major pathways in the elimination of these two drugs, are catalysed by the same cytochrome P-450 isoenzyme(s). In the present study we used site-directed mutagenesis and cDNA expression in COS cells to characterize in detail the kinetics of tolbutamide and phenytoin hydroxylations by seven CYP2C proteins (2C8, 2C9 and variants, and 2C10) in order to define the effects of small changes in amino acid sequences and the likely proteins responsible in the metabolism of these two drugs in man. Tolbutamide was hydroxylated to varying extents by all expressed cytochrome P-450 isoenzymes, although activity was much lower for the expressed 2C8 protein. While the apparent Km values for the 2C9/10 isoenzymes (71.6-131.7 microM) were comparable with the range of apparent Km values previously observed in human liver microsomes, the apparent Km for 2C8 (650.5 microM) was appreciably higher. The 2C8 enzyme also showed quite different sulphaphenazole inhibition characteristics. The 4-hydroxylation of phenytoin was also more efficiently catalysed by the 2C9/10 enzymes. These enzymes showed similarities in kinetics of phenytoin hydroxylation and sulphaphenazole inhibition compared with human liver phenytoin hydroxylase. Also of interest was the observation that, among the 2C9 variants, small differences in amino acid composition could appreciably affect both tolbutamide and phenytoin hydroxylations. The amino acid substitution Cys-144-->Arg increased both the rates of tolbutamide and phenytoin hydroxylations, while the Leu-359-->Ile change had a greater effect on phenytoin hydroxylation. We conclude that: (1) although 2C8 and 2C9/10 proteins metabolize tolbutamide. only 2C9/10 proteins play a major role in human liver; (2) 2C9/10 proteins also appear to be chiefly responsible for phenytoin hydroxylation; and (3) subtle differences in the amino acid composition of these 2C9/10 proteins can affect the functional specificities towards both tolbutamide and phenytoin.