This new decision support module, currently only available in eMIMS, has been developed by a team at the University Of Sydney School Of Pharmacy. The locally researched, evidence based drug herb interactions are designed to provide the health professional with the ability to retrieve information on clinically-significant drug and herb interactions.
The University of Sydney, School of Pharmacy, have chosen UnityHealth’s IMgateway solution to bring this important work to the desktop of healthcare professionals.
In an Australian first, MIMS has partnered with UnityHealth’s IMgateway to bring an Australian evidence based Complementary V Mainstream drug interaction module to MIMS.
To provide us with your feedback regarding this new module please email us at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Overview
IMgateway Drug to Herb, food and traditional Chinese Medicines Interactions
The development of the interactions data base has been updated and expanded since its inception in 2002.
The interaction record contains a description of the interaction what could be expected if there is an interaction, severity of the interaction, strength of the supporting evidence and precautions needed. This helps the healthcare professional and, eventually, the patient to avoid adverse events.
For each interaction there is a link through to further information about the evidence presented.
The IMgateway database within eMIMS is continually evolving and growing in the number of evidence based interactions reported and will enable health professionals to retrieve evidence-based information on clinically-significant drug and herb interactions, drug and food interactions and now drug and Traditional Chinese Medicines (TMC) and Japanese Kampo Medicines interactions.
The IMgateway module enables a search of a complementary medicine against a prescription medicine (or vice-versa), to quickly obtain a recommendation on whether the combination should be avoided or requires caution.
The new database makes clinical recommendations on the significance of herb-drug interactions based on the National Health and Medical Research Council's levels of evidence scale.
By selecting a prescribed medicine and an herbal product this module will display all known interactions according to the evidence based work done by the team at Sydney University. For each result of the drug herb function, there is an ‘at-a-glance’ commentary on the evidence, a severity rating* advice to the patient which includes the detail of the interaction, and all the relevant references should you require further information.
IMgateway drug interaction data is available within eMIMS as an additional subscription. For more information about this subscription please call our client services team on 1800 800 629.
Key Features
This evolving and extensive database of drug interactions is constantly reviewed and updated, and is currently only available in eMIMS where the updates will be available each month.
Key features include:
- Locally researched, evidence based interaction module that will help the understanding of the impact of prescription medicines when combined with herbs, food, traditional Chinese medicines ( TCM and Japanese Kampo Medicines Makes clinical recommendations on the significance of these interactions based on the National Health and Medical Research Council's levels of evidence scale
- The IMgateway interactions are constantly reviewed and updated
- Full referenced
- A unique database because it is based on the Australian market
*Severity ratings Disclaimer
This interaction has both a MIMS and IMgateway result. The principles of the severity ratings used by IMgateway and MIMS are different. Please ensure you read all of the information about these interactions and do not rely on the severity level alone to make your clinical decision.
Editorial
Strategy
The editorial team meets periodically to review the overall approach and consider specific elements of the herb-drug interaction database. The focus of these meetings is on the scope, content and relevance of the monographs and the manner in which the data are presented and discussed. At these meetings the editorial team would also consider the response to any feedback received on the database.
Process: Search, write and review
On a weekly basis, a Research Pharmacist from the University of Sydney carries out an extensive literature search to identify new herb-drug interactions and update existing herb-drug interactions with the most recent, up-to-date literature. Based on a critical analysis of the available literature for a specific herb-drug interaction, the Research Pharmacist drafts the 'Advice for the patient' and 'Commentary on evidence' sections of the interaction monograph, and provides a draft general recommendation for the interaction.
The interaction monograph is then editorially reviewed and approved (after any amendments) by a senior member of the editorial team at the Faculty of Pharmacy, University of Sydney. The process of review focusses on the nature and quality of the evidence and clinical relevance of the potential interaction. Monographs are always written from an international perspective.
Critical appraisal
Central to the inclusion of any data in herb-drug interactions in the database is the process of careful critical appraisal of the published studies from international literature. This process is facilitated by documents such as the CONSORT statement on reporting randomized, controlled trials of herbal interventions (Gagnier et al, 2006) and the NHMRC hierarchy of assessing evidence.
The Editorial team
The writing and review team is made up of researchers with specific experience in clinical practice, pharmaceutical industry, scientific evaluation of herbal medicines, herbal medicines clinical research (including investigation of herb-drug interactions), clinical pharmacology, scholarly publication, peer review and biopharmaceutics. Taken together, this skill mix provides the best opportunity to develop high quality monographs of herb-drug interactions that have relevance to guide clinical practice.
Reference : Gagnier JJ, Boon H, Rochon P, Moher D, Barnes J, Bombardier C. Reporting randomized, controlled trials of herbal interventions: an elaborated CONSORT statement. Ann Intern Med 2006; 144(5):364-367
Availability
This “Australian Made” evidence based, drug herb interaction database is available in eMIMS.
For further information please contact our Client Services Team on 1800 800 629 or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
