[Experience with the organization of drug information in Hungary (author's transl)]

Medicinal therapy is changing more dynamically than all other fields of medicine. New therapeutic techniques, new drugs and combinations of drugs are in such a rapid succession that the knowledge required in modern therapeutic approaches can be imparted in time to physicians and pharmacists only by means of an adequate information system. In 1958, the Ministry of Health (consulting pharmacists) started the National Organization of Drug Information and charged the National Pharmaceutical Institute with its direction and further development. In the past 22 years this Organization established by its activity a co-operation between pharmacists and physicians which functions so well that now it cannot be dispensed with in everyday work. 50 specially qualified pharmacists are members of the Central Organization of Drug Information. An analysis of the therapeutic methods and of the supply of drugs testified to the positive activity of this Organization and to the need for its further development. In the framework of the health departments of the counties and of the pharmaceutical centres, there exists a so-called network of drug information, the activities of which are guided by members of the National Pharmaceutical Institute. The ever extending network of drug information is of incontestable value to the public health service, the medicinal therapy and to the correct information about drugs from the viewpoints of science and ethnics.