“It is medicine three points of poison”, “medicine can cure, but also can hurt”, these truths we all understand, but how to avoid drug harm is not always able to master the essentials of harm. This article gives you a few common sense. First, prescription drugs must be prescribed by a doctor. The characteristics of prescription drugs are: for more serious or complex diseases, the patient himself can not make an accurate judgment. For example, antibiotics, hormones, anti-tumor drugs, a variety of cardiovascular drugs, psychiatric and narcotic drugs, etc., the risk of taking drugs is greater, must be prescribed by a doctor before you can buy or use drugs. Such as antipyretic and analgesic drugs, diarrhea with Huanglian, cough drops, various topical drugs, vitamins, etc., belong to the patient can be based on common sense to judge the over-the-counter drugs, safety is also relatively high, you can buy their own, but do not think that over-the-counter drugs are safe. Second, the safety of new drugs is a bigger problem. New drug research and development to go through three major stages: first, the discovery of a chemical or biological substance with potential medicinal value, then in animals to do effectiveness and toxicity experiments, and finally enter the clinical trial stage; clinical trials and to go through a long three phases. It takes 6 to 12 years to study a new drug from discovery to market! Eventually a new drug can be screened out from 100,000 to 300,000 substances! So why is it still not safe? It is important to know that there are only 400 pairs of cases participating in the clinical trials of a drug, and if the incidence of a serious adverse reaction of the drug is one in a thousand, it may not be detected in the clinical trials, and may be “exposed” only after the market. In addition, clinical trials set a lot of selection or exclusion criteria for participants, and the selected cases are relatively simple, while the clinical reality is very complex, so the results obtained from the trials and clinical practice are bound to be different. It can be seen that new drugs may be better in terms of efficacy, but not necessarily better in terms of safety. The first of the 21 deaf angels who performed at the Spring Festival Gala in 2005, 18 of them became deaf after using aminoglycoside antibiotics. It is impossible to prove whether their initial medication was reasonable or not, but it must be a fact that they became disabled. It is clear that there is a risk of correct and reasonable use of drugs, and the risk of incorrect and unreasonable use is even greater, such as improper indication, improper dosage, improper compounding, improper route of administration, improper storage of drugs, and continued use of drugs after the expiration date. In short, the use of drugs “unsafe” is absolute, reasonable use of drugs can relatively improve safety. Fourth, do not listen to advertisements to self-medicate. Prescription drugs are not advertised in the public media. For advertised drugs, you should pay more attention to them. Please be wary of the following false advertising words: 1. exaggerated efficacy: such as “one shot”, “no rebound”, “no more surgery”; 2. exaggerated safety: such as “safe drugs”, “safe and non-toxic”, “safe and no side effects”; 3, foxes and tigers: such as “the United States so-and-so Dr. dedicated research “, “Chinese Medical Association certification”, “a scientific research institute (Institute of Pharmaceutical Research) certification”; 4, payment temptation category: such as “first use and then pay”, “ineffective refund”, “the”. “invalid refund”, “cheap price” and so on. Special reminder: scammer ads will also specialize in cheating incurable diseases, infertility, STD patients and the elderly. Take the case, take the stars to advertise drugs should also be treated with caution. Fifth, improve compliance with medication, reduce the victimization of ignorance. Compliance is not simply “listen to the doctor, according to the doctor’s instructions”, but refers to learn to self-observe and correctly deal with adverse reactions in the use of drugs on the basis of medical advice, once the adverse reactions to report to the doctor in a timely manner, do not deal with adverse reactions on their own, including not to stop the drug. Compliance also includes increasing or decreasing the dose, intermittent use, stopping the medication, adding or decreasing the variety of drugs, increasing or decreasing the time of medication, changing the way of medication, changing the medication on an empty stomach, etc. without the doctor’s consent, which may increase the incidence of adverse reactions and may also seriously weaken the efficacy of drugs. Finally, I’d like to send you a message: drugs are not safe and need to be used with caution; proper knowledge of drugs can be of great benefit to yourself and your family, and may be life-saving.