©FSRH J Fam Plann Reprod Health Care 2009: 35(3) Background There is no doubt that the combined oral contraceptive pill (COC) has revolutionised and changed women’s lives for the better. With the discovery of progestogens in the 1940s/1950s, and the realisation that the accidental addition of synthetic estrogen [mestranol – the inactive precursor of ethinylestradiol (EE)] improved bleeding patt...

Madam I look forward to the arrival of the Journal. It is always a good read, full of relevant and practical information – much more ‘user-friendly’ than most journals I receive these days. July’s edition seemed particularly interesting with a number of interesting articles. However, my interest was quickly replaced by irritation. There is a lot to be said for evidencebased medicine (EBM) and i...

BACKGROUND Prescription errors that occur due to the process of pill splitting are a common medication problem; however, available prescription information involving inappropriate pill splitting and its associated factors is lacking. METHODS We retrospectively evaluated a cohort of ambulatory prescriptions involving extended-release or enteric-coated formulations in a Taiwan medical center du...

Ten subjects (mean age 57 years) took part in a crossover study between a food drink and nitrazepam 5 mg. They rated their anxiety and sleep quality. On half the sleep laboratory nights during baseline periods subjects were given an inert pill which they were told would improve sleep. A comparison was made between the six pill and six non-pill nights for each subject. Subjective ratings reveale...

We write to report the fi ndings of a questionnaire study within a large family planning centre in the UK that examined women’s knowledge and understanding of the current missed pills rules. Three different sets of missed pill rules have been available to the 3.5 million combined oral contraception (COC) users in the UK. The guidance from the World Health Organization and the Faculty of Sexual ...

OBJECTIVES Suboptimal medication adherence for infectious diseases such as tuberculosis (TB) results in poor clinical outcomes and ongoing infectivity. Directly observed therapy (DOT) is now standard of care for TB treatment monitoring but has a number of limitations. We aimed to develop and evaluate a smartphone-based system to facilitate remotely observed therapy via transmission of videos ra...