Watch the side effects.
Motrin could be damaging your liver.
Aspirin could cause stomach bleeding.
New warnings about these dangers will be required for all over the counter drugs used to treat pain, fever, headaches and muscle aches under new rules proposed by the Food and Drug Administration.
But it?s not just the elderly and people who suffer ulcers who need to worry, according to a news release from the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy.
“The increase in polypharmacy ? taking more than one medication ? as well as taking these medications chronically,” increases the risk of complications, professor Sheila Weiss said. “People are taking chronic medication for pain, and then they get a cold and take a medication that has the same pain killer in it.”
Common products containing aspirin, ibuprofen, naproxen and ketoprofen, are used to treat pain, fever, headaches and muscle aches, but they are not for everyone. The population is aging and more people are at risk of complications from over the counter medications, said Weiss, who specializes in drug safety.
Further complications arise when a woman is pregnant or about to deliver a baby.
The FDA rule will apply to combination over-the-counter cold medicines as well as prescription drugs that contain these pain killers so people will be aware of how much of these medicines they are taking. Public comments can be filed online at www.fda.gov and will be published Tuesday.
“It is important to consider that everything has risks (as well as benefits) and over-the-counter medications do too,” Weiss said. “Just a very small increase in risk can quickly become a number of people injured if the use is widespread.”
