Insights Newsletter: December 2022

Put Cardiovascular Risks with Triptans in Perspective 

• Pain Point: Questions continue to come up about which patients with migraine should avoid triptans due to cardiovascular concerns. For example, alerts often pop up about using triptans in patients with cardiovascular risks, but it’s hard to know when these alerts are clinically significant. 
• Solution: Our Pharmacist’s Letter, Hospital Pharmacist’s Letter, Pharmacist’s Letter Canada, and Prescriber’s Letter articles outline the history of how cardiovascular contraindications landed in triptan package labeling decades ago and how our understanding of cardiovascular disease and migraine has changed over the years. We also give advice on how to evaluate whether patients with cardiovascular risk factors can use a triptan and share practical examples to help individualize recommendations. Our resource, Drugs for Acute Migraine, has a more detailed list of available migraine treatment options, dosing considerations, and contraindications.

Help Patients Navigate OTC Hearing Aids

• Pain Point: Hearing aids are popping up in pharmacies and other retailers now that an FDA rule allows them to be sold over the counter (OTC). Pharmacy teams and prescribers will need to be prepared to answer questions about which patients are appropriate for hearing aids, how to select a product, and how to use it properly.  
• Solution: Our Pharmacist’s Letter, Pharmacy Technician’s Letter, and Prescriber’s Letter articles highlight differences between OTC and prescription hearing aids and personal sound amplification products. We provide advice on how to identify potential candidates for OTC hearing aids, which screening questions to ask, and when to recommend a hearing test. Guidance on how to screen for red flags and when to refer patients to an audiologist is also covered.

We also feature information on how to help your pharmacists answer with confidence when asked about natural medicines and highlight our Natural Medicines Resource Hub. Don’t miss our new on-demand webinar, and be sure to check out December’s most popular charts for our Letter products.

Read December’s issue of Insights Newsletter.