When it comes to pain, self-medicate with care

[10 April 2007 - 12h05]
[mis à jour le 11 April 2007 à 14h47]

Some doctors in France are becoming concerned about the use of Diantalvic and generic forms of the drug. The authorities in New Zealand are questioning the use of these drugs following the deaths of 16 patients and they have already been withdrawn from the British and Swedish markets. But in France, the AFSSaPS has decided not to impose any restriction on their use.

Any additional restriction, that is. Because in France, at least, these drugs are not freely available. The recommendations of the French Health Products Safety Agency (AFSSaPS ) remain unchanged. As far as the authorities are concerned, drugs based on the combination of paracetamol and dextropropoxyphen (DXP/PC) (there are some thirty of them on the market) do not represent a risk to public health because they are only available on prescription.

In this respect, however, the situation in France is very different from that in many of the developing countries where medicines are often freely available in pharmacies. The AFSSaPS stresses that the risk of intoxication is real. It reminds us that “the average daily dose of combined DXP/PC is 4 capsules per day and should never exceed 6 capsules per day”.

And it is essential that Diantalvic – and similar products – are never taken as self medication. Other analgesics can be used, especially paracetamol. Furthermore, an article devoted to this in the journal Prescrire states that “despite decades of large-scale marketing, it has not been shown that combined dextropropoxyphen-paracetamol is any more effective that paracetamol alone”…

Source : AFSSaPS, 5 April 2007, Revue Prescrire, 2007 ; 27 (282) : 274

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