Epidemiology of Drug Allergy: Drug Monitoring

The interval between the initial observation of symptoms and syndromes and the final recognition of a disease entity, with known pathogenesis or aetiology, may be a long one and much careful investigation may be necessary. At one end of the whole procedure is clinical observation and at the other, medical science and epidemiology. This principle also holds true for adverse drug effects and drug-induced illnesses. In any system designed to detect adverse reactions to drugs it is of fundamental importance to observe each syndrome or symptom and to record it, independently of its interpretation (Hoigne 1978). Evaluation can follow two distinct routes: a review of interpreted, individual data, or a statistical analysis of non-or not extensively interpreted events.