Talk:Paracetamol

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Archives
Archive 1: 2003 — July 2006

1 No Side-effects and Age.
2 Merge proposal with Paracetamol poisoning
3 Panadol availability in the US
4 Brand names
5 PT/INR and paracetamol
6 Paracetomol in cats and dogs
7 Naming Conventions
8 U.S. recall of generic paracetamol
9 Paracetamol in Australia

[edit] No Side-effects and Age.

I believe that one should mention side-effects (as opposed to toxicity), even if one had the courage to say "no-one has ever had side-effects from this drug" - which is anyway the deduction a reader may make from this article. Patients taking paracetamol can complain of abdominal pain, and of sleepiness, but these have not been linked to paracetamol as such. One wonders whether people really bother to look for these - the drug is sort of "as everyone knows" safe? I recently (past year at least) read a review saying that the recommended dose for paracetamol in the aged (80-95 years) is now 3g/24h. As I recall it had to do with unexpectedly rapid decline in renal function or increase in liver enzymes at 4g/24h, but I cannot find the reference now. Has anyone else seen it? --Seejyb 23:17, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merge proposal with Paracetamol poisoning

Anon editor made good observation on the Paracetamol poisoning article (I've copied across the observation and adjusted tags onto both articles):

Information on overdose in the Paracetamol article seems to be more thorough and accurate.

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 12.33.232.124 (talk • contribs). 18:58, 24 July 2006

The Paracetamol poisoning does indeed seem to be a poor duplication of what is currently on Paracetamol. The options are I think:

Delete Paracetamol poisoning, moving across anything that needs be retained or
Split Toxicology off from Paracetamol to replace/improve on Paracetamol poisoning; leaving just short paragraph or two with a linking tag of: {{main|Paracetamol poisoning}} David Ruben ^Talk 14:53, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Agree with merger of paracetamol poisoning into paracetamol article. On the other hand, paracetamol poisoning is a distinct enough entity in and of itself that a separate article could probably be stand on its own as well. Andrew73 14:47, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
Paracetamol poisoning ought to be merged, as that is the main encyclopedic subject. Paracetamol is not currently bloated or unwieldy. —Centrx→talk • 17:29, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

I've merged the articles. As stated above, there didn't appear to be many differences between the two articles. --Uthbrian (talk) 07:47, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Panadol availability in the US

The article notes the locations in which various brands are sold; Panadol, while sometimes difficult to find, is available in the US. In cities with sizeable Hispanic populations (at least as far north as Indiana), certain stores (notably Walgreens and Wal-Mart) carry Panadol, presumably because of its popularity in Latin America. I'm not sure if I should add the US to Panadol's availability list, since its popularity is considerably less than Tylenol. Suggestions? Perhaps add the US to the list and note that availability is limited? Student Driver 20:15, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Brand names

is the "brand name" section that has just been added really necessary? If i recall, the drug is available generically worldwide, so there is little to no point putting a list of the possible brands, and just adds more confusion to an allready long article. I'm reverting back to the old version for the moment.

[edit] PT/INR and paracetamol

There is a know interaction between tylenol and PT/INR blood clotting times. It is no where near the level of NSAIDs but persons on warfarin therapy should not read the article and believe it is safe to take tylenol as it can increase clotting times substantially. I changed to articles to reflect this. Comment? --Tbeatty 05:02, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

This is only true when using paracetamol in large doses over an extended period of time. I have never heard of a clinically relevant effect when using normal doses. Do you have any references for this? --WS 07:47, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Paracetomol in cats and dogs

Although paracetomol is highly toxic in cats as stated, it can be and is used safely in dogs at the correct dose of 10mg/kg twice daily, in fact there is a paracetomol product (Pardale-V[1]) which has a product licence for use in dogs and has been on the market for decades. This section of the article as it stands is misleading and has led to unnecessary worry on the part of dog owners as it contradicts veterinary advice. I propose to edit the paragraph accordingly.--Vetedit1982 22:05, 6 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Naming Conventions

I have noticed some confusion among pharmacy patients about the information available on the internet concerning paracetamol/acetaminophen. It is usually due to the, often undefined, interchangable use of the two names. I would like to encourage the use of the abbrevation APAP (which is does not have a second version) when referring to the drug when the other names are not defined on the page. Thank You. --Matt 161.45.236.217 17:54, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

There are policies on the wikipedia defining the naming of the articles. For drugs the naming is in general the INN name (which is in this case paracetamol, hence the article is on this page). If you think there are things to clarify, then I would recommend that a section about the naming is added, with an explanation aimed at resolving the confusion. APAP can be created as a redirect to the INN name of paracetamol, in general it is discouraged to use the abbreviation as the main name of the article, since there may be other uses for the acronym. I hope this clarifies. --Dirk Beetstra ^{T C} 22:11, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

I understand that the use of names is usually standardized on Wikipedia, which has been fairly good about providing information to paitents. (Although the whole truth sometimes causes some fear, but that is expected and easily dealt with.) I really was suggesting the use in all cases on the internet, not just here. I just want to make sure that paitents don't get the naming conventions confused with another drug. We had a woman recently who had some liver damage because she read that her medicine contained Paracetamol, so she reasoned that she could take here usual tylenol for her pain (4tabs) She was lucky. Personally, I think that we should only use one name, and I don't care which one, but I'm not in the position to change anything.Matt 161.45.237.73 15:45, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

The problem is that we are not in a position to use more than one name for a given drug. While we try to set up redirects as far as this is possible, the article has to be stored at a single place on the servers. Equally, Wikipedia does not give medical advice: we summarize published material on certain compounds which happen to be used as drugs, which is rather different. A change in the article name would make this information harder to find for many users. Physchim62 (talk) 17:42, 20 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] U.S. recall of generic paracetamol

I have moved the note added by Zandperl (talk • contribs) to the top of the article into a separate section. IMHO this is a notable incident which merits inclusion in the article, although I am unsure as to the future permanence of this section — perhaps a "Notable incidents" section could be created, with a short note on the 1982 Chicago Tylenol murders as well. Comments and criticism are more than welcome. Fvasconcellos 14:05, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Recalls like this are not really the stuff of Wikipedia until after the event: we are supposed to be an encyclopedia and not a news service. Physchim62 (talk) 15:25, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree; I, however, chose to keep the information because a) I am wary of removing others' contributions when they are made in good faith and are neither damaging nor misleading, and b) it's a fair assumption that people (particularly in the U.S.) may be turning to Wikipedia for information regarding this incident. Maybe it should indeed be removed, and re-added later if it's still worth it? Fvasconcellos 16:17, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the note Fvasconcellos.

I'm the one who put it in. My reasoning was threefold: (1) we do sometimes document current events (for example, US hurricanes), (2) people may turn to Wikipedia for information about this event, and (3) it's a piece of information that could help our users. If Wikinews appeared to have an article, perhaps a link to it would be most appropriate, but I couldn't find one. My opinion is that for now it seems appropriate to at least leave the information somewhere in the article. It can be removed with time when it is less relevant. --zandperl 21:05, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Paracetamol in Australia

Just pointing out that Paracetamol in australia is commonly known as 'Panadol' rather than 'Herron'. Should I change the intro? --Gunny01 05:19, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

The list of trade names should probably be sorted into alphabetical order. Herron is still a trade name for Paracetamol in Australia [2] (although we may possibly be spam victims given the promenance of the name). Physchim62 (talk) 17:43, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

I fail to see, on evidence of http://www.herron.com.au/products/analgesics/analgesics.html that Herron is specifically a trade or brand name for Paracetamol. As the link clearly shows, Herron seems to be used as a trading name for the company, i.e. name of a product range which includes paracetamol and ibuprofen, hence "Herron Paracetamol" and "Herron Blue Ibuprofen". Compare to their laxative products http://www.herron.com.au/products/laxatives/laxatives.html for which "Sennetabs" and "SenneSoft" are brand names. Hence is not Herron merely just a generic paracetamol manufacturer and so inappropriate to list in the introduction's collection of branded products ? Conversely the US Tylenol or UK Panadol ranges all contain paracetamol. However, not living in Australia, I am not aware how notable Herron is in terms of market share, primacy by dates of marketing in Australia, or of the common usage of the term "Herron" (maybe is is perceived by the Australian public as a synonym, eg as "Kleenex" is for tissues or "Hoover" for vacuum cleaner). David Ruben ^Talk 02:38, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

I've removed Herron as a brand name in Australia and added Australia to the Tylenol list. Herron is a manufacturer of many products, one of which is "Herron Paracetamol" (Mollwollfumble 01:45, 13 December 2006 (UTC))

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