Tasty Medication Poses Risk For Children
By Dr. Brian McDonough, Medical Editor
PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - It is called compliance - getting patients to take prescribed medications and to take them consistently.
As doctors, it is often difficult to get our patients to be compliant. I have found the best way to do it is to explain carefully why the drugs need to be taken and to get all parties to buy in and believe in the importance.
In children the battle can be a big one - especially if the child thinks the medicine tastes bad. Recently drug manufactures have started to flavor medications to make them taste good.
Now, it sounds good on the surface, but there's a problem. If medications taste good, they could be a temptation to kids. Then you have the issue of a child taking pills that could be extremely dangerous because of the taste.
If you choose to go with flavored medications, please tuck them away and make sure they have safety bottles. Just another thing to think about.