Early reports on drug interactions

Letters in correspondence columns or brief reports in medical journals are an essential part of an early warning system, and they are invaluable in alerting clinicians and clinical pharmacists to associations between drugs and their reactions. A survey of the literature during the first half of 1982 has identified a number of these early reports; some are purely anecdotal, others may be coincidental, but all serve to warn the practitioner of potential hazard. Brief information on the following reports of drug-drug interactions is given in this article with the intention of giving these reports wider publicity and, possibly, encouraging further observation and research to establish or disprove their validity in a larger and wider range of patients or volunteer subjects. The following interactions are reviewed: amiodarone-quinidine, lidocaine-prenylamine, erythromycin-carbamazepine, azapropazone-phenytoin, chlordiazepoxide-levodopa, gentamicin-furosemide, ethanol-aspirin, acetaminophen-coumarin anticoagulant, and cimetidine-lidocaine.