Always ASK When Your Doctor Prescribes an Antibiotic!
Joe has recently been told he needs cataract surgery. No biggie right? We went in to the Doc’s office yesterday to see the ophthalmologist who will be performing the surgery on Joe’s eyes. Her assistant handed us an Rx for Vigamox.
Now, Joe’s chart quite clearly says that he is sensitive to Penicillin, Levaquin, Cipro, and cephalosporins. I had never heard of Vigamox. Later, when the Doctor came in to talk to us, I asked if it was a version of amoxicillin. No, she said, it wasn’t. Then she flipped over to the pages of Joe’s drug sensitivities. She said that it wasn’t related to penicillin but it was related to Levaquin and Cipro and asked what Joe’s reactions were to these drugs. Joe explained in as few words as possible what had happened and said he really didn’t want to run the risk of using an eye drop that might affect the nerves or tendons. She said she’d never heard of any adverse effects of this drug but she did switch the drug to a non-FQ.
So, I came home and checked… Vigamox is just another version of Avelox. The generic is moxifloxacin. Now, whether or not the drug might possibly have an adverse effect for an average patient is not applicable here, as far as I am concerned. What is applicable is that the patient, Joe in this case, had previously reacted to ANY fluoroquinolone.
So, EVEN if you have listed that you are sensitive to FQs, or that you refuse to take FQs… if someone gives you an Rx, ASK … it could be an old FQ with a new name.
© 2011
