The NIDA Monographs: A Guide to the Scientific Study of Drug Use

National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) administrators and staff identify critical research questions and select knowledgeable scientists. NIDA monographs incorporate the papers produced by those scientists. The monographs are a rich source of ideas, concepts and advice on drug use research. This paper introduces a special journal issue that includes summaries of papers from monographs on etiology and prevention research.     

Could Swedish 'yellow cards' be substituted by E-coded summaries?

Case summaries of 2490 patients treated at the Department of Infectious Diseases, Danderyd Hospital, in 1986 were reviewed for discharge diagnoses where the International Classification of Disease (ICD) code indicated an adverse drug reaction (ADR) [E 939,9 in ICD 8]. Of 48 patients whose case summaries indicated an ADR, only 10 (21%) had been reported on 'yellow cards' to the Swedish Adverse Drug Reactions Advisory Committee. The Committee had also received from the same department 3 reports where the case summary lacked an ADR code. The information on drug treatment with respect to dosage, duration and treatment with concomitant drugs was not complete in the case summaries but sufficient for a preliminary evaluation of the suspected reactions in all but 4 of the cases. On the basis of these findings the authors do not reach an outright conclusion in favour of replacing the 'yellow card' system but the possible benefits of a system in which 'yellow cards' are supplemented by automatic referral of all case summaries containing an ICD code indicating an adverse drug reaction was judged sufficient to recommend and initiate a large field study.     

The use of a microcomputer for collecting screening data and for conducting range finding experiments on muscle relaxant drugs

This report describes a method that has been developed to use an Apple II Plus microcomputer in data collection, data analysis, and transfer of raw and summary data to a data base that is maintained on a larger computer. The compounds being screened are potential skeletal muscle relaxants acting at the neuromuscular junction. The microcomputer produces a CRT (cathode ray tube) display resembling the data sheets previously used in a drug screening project. It prompts the user to enter the following data through the keyboard: compound number, date, drug solution, animal weight, desired compound dose. From the entered data, the microcomputer calculates and displays the appropriate injection volume so that a technician will be shown the exact dose that is to be injected into the test animal. Following injection, the mouse is immediately placed on an inclined screen as described by Pradham and De [1953]. Times to onset and offset of muscle paralysis are entered and displayed on the CRT. For lower doses, the effects of the drug on respiration are recorded. After these primary data are recorded, all other relevant data are elicited by a menu of appropriate pharmacological questions. Data from each animal are stored in a random access file on a 5.25-in. floppy disk. From these files tabular and narrative reports of the drug's effects can be automatically generated. The data are also sent by telephone modem to a data base that is maintained on a larger computer for access by chemists in structure–activity studies. This method has greatly increased the speed and efficiency of data collection and report generation. Furthermore, it has allowed the raw data to be easily searched and reviewed in subsequent structure–activity studies. Because this data collection system is small and self-contained, it may be mobed easily to different testing sites.