[Development of the database on nonproprietary names of drugs]

This paper describes the outline of the database of nonproprietary names of drugs and the characteristics of its online search system. The database includes the records of officially authorized names by WHO, International Nonproprietary Names (INN), and those by Japanese Government, Japanese Accepted Names (JAN). The INN file is merged with the JAN file. The online retrieval system is designed to enable search for drugs by generic names adopted on an international level and a national level in both English and Japanese. It is operated with INQ (DBMS) in the NEC ACOS-6 computer. Data from INN are updated once a year, and those from JAN are added whenever the official announcement of newly approved drugs are published in Yakumu-Koho (official pharmaceutical gazette).