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While I support the WHO and its efforts to provide standardised information - this attempt fall too short to be useful. It would not have taken much to provide
by MrDrDr 5y ago
While I support the WHO and its efforts to provide standardised information - this attempt fall too short to be useful. It would not have taken much to provide a little more meta-data for this to be far more useful. In the UK we have a SNOMED extension (dm+d) for medicines and some great work has been done here: https://openprescribing.net/dmd/ https://openprescribing.net/dmd/
- teachingassist 5y agoThe Essential Medicines list has a very clear purpose, which it satisfies. It states what medicines are essential - to give an indication of what minimum preparations can to be made (by states) for these to be stocked and affordable. But, it's not intended as a dictionary/classification system. It's not intended to be a comprehensive list of medicines available in the UK. That's for the UK to decide. This list was not made for you (nor anyone else commenting negatively in this thread). It doesn't fit your purpose, and that's fine.
- MrDrDr 5y agoI'll respectively disagree that it provides a list of medicines. It provides a list of 'Chemical agents', their ideal form and dose. My point is the over generalisation of these lists. Behind each chemical is an actual product that has actually been licensed to use in a specific jurisdiction and the indications for which it is licensed. This gap between the general and the 'actual' is one of the main reasons medicines health data is so difficult to share and these ambiguities can be dangerous. To your point that it does not fit my purpose - I agree. But what purpose does this list serve? Who is the 'user' of such a general list?