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A question of balance

Nature volume 430, pages 401–402 (2004)Cite this article

How safe are the medicines that are prescribed to children?

How did we let this happen? The bodies that license medicines in many countries require pharmaceutical companies to disclose the results of all relevant clinical trials if they are applying for a licence to market a drug for a particular disease. But children and adolescents are not always protected by this safeguard, as many drugs used to treat children are used ‘off-licence’ — that is, they are not licensed for a particular condition in children, but can be used if a doctor recommends it. Estimates from the United Kingdom suggest that at least 50% of all drugs used to treat children in hospitals are off-licence1. Except for child-specific conditions, trials of medications in children are less common, as they are often difficult to conduct, and so less is known about how effective or safe many medicines are for children.

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Acknowledgements

Iain Chalmers, Rosie Nicol-Harper, Alan Stein and Stuart Logan provided helpful comments.

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  1. Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Oxford, OX3 7JX, UK

    Paul Ramchandani

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  1. Paul Ramchandani
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Ramchandani, P. A question of balance. Nature 430, 401–402 (2004). https://doi.org/10.1038/430401a

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