Evaluation of prescriptions drug-drug interactions in a public hospital in Al-Kharj, Saudi Arabia

Drug-drug interactions (DDIs) are one of the most considerable problems in drug prescriptions, the consequences of these interactions range from no harmful effect to drug associated morbidity and mortality. The aim of the present study is to determine the prevalence of potential DDIs in one public hospital in Al-Kharj. The data were collected from patients’ medical records in one public hospital. After that, the data were analyzed for the potential drug interactions using Drug-Reax®. Out of the 800 prescriptions, 290 have at least 1 drug-drug interaction (36.25 %). The majority of the DDIs in our study were of moderate severity. The prevalence of potential DDIs is high among patients in the outpatient settings. Therefore, we recommend that the physicians and pharmacists have to use software that detects the DDIs to avoid harmful interactions and also pharmacists should check for drug interactions before dispensing the prescriptions.