A link to a new drug database

DrugBank Homepage

This has been characterised as the world's largest drug database. It is an "one-stop-shop" with drug information for patients, researchers and healthcare professionals. Although based in Canada, it includes FDA-approved drugs. It has about 4100 drug entries. Each entry includes all the various names, the chemical formula, how it works in chemical-speak, patient information, interactions, contraindications, etc.

The patient information is such as you would find on the bottle (don't operate machinery, etc.) rather than full-blown information sheets, so most of the information is meant for researchers and clinicians. Still, having everything together is really great.

I have to admit

It probably made a certain amount of sense to wait to tell the families the crushing news until they were sure of who had survived and who had died. But I still think they could have come out and said, 'we were wrong, please wait for further information' and stopped the celebration.

Man, I would not want to be the head of this company, dealing with an explosion, employee deaths, and the fallout of an information fiasco. I wouldn't be surprised if there were death threats on top of that (not condoning mind you, just observing that there's a lot of anger and bitterness as the result of this, along with the mourning).

Lexington Herald-Leader | 01/05/2006 | Mining company lost control of information

A little news with a local tie-in

KRT Wire | 01/04/2006 | Sheikh of Dubai, a leading horse breeder, dies of heart attack

I think it's awful

that for three hours the families of these miners were under the mistaken belief that twelve of the thirteen had survived, due to miscommunication, when in actuality one of the thirteen managed to survive the toxic fumes inside the mine. How awful for them. It was chilling today that the jubilation was frozen in print when those of us who had heard the news coverage or read the updates on the Internet learnt the awful truth. I cannot imagine how distraught and angry these families must be, and they have my deepest sympathy.

Update 57: Mine Co. Head Expresses Regret to Families - Forbes.com

Remarkably

my feet are finally getting used to the standing at job #3, which is good, as I worked tonight and will again tomorrow night, followed by a ten-hour shift on Saturday. Tonight they hurt just a little, and that came in the last hour as I was stocking the cooler, which has a concrete slab without any cushion like the mat we have at the cash register.

In one day

I've had 149 intrusion attempts blocked by my firewall, seven of them high-rated.

Yay for firewalls.

Note to self

take smart medicine #2 (ADDerall) BEFORE you take a shower. It helps if you remember to wash your hair.

I couldn't figure out why my hair looked limp and sad today, and then I remembered; I'd used the shower gel but not the shampoo. Oh, well, at least I washed my hair before going to job #3. :)

Can you imagine?

going to your pharmacy and being told, sorry, you can't get the drug you've been taking for years--and the only thing that's been working for you, because they pulled it due to concerns over liver damage?

Now, I understand being concerned over potential damaging side effects of medication--virtually every drug has some unwanted effect possible. But this drug has been around for a long time--at least twenty-five years, and the number of people who do not suffer bad effects surely should outweigh the concerns. Even so, if you must pull something, shouldn't you have to phase something out gradually, and at the very least, notify patients that it won't be available? Finding out at the pharmacy (and in this case even the pharmacy didn't know until it contacted the wholesaler) isn't really acceptable.

Anyway, I'm sorry for those who got left hanging. Maybe the Narcolepsy Network and others concerned over this will be able to get out the word. For those of us who rely on medications to be productive members of society--whether it's for seizures, pain, ADD, narcolepsy, or a host of different chronic ailments--it's scary to think that our medicines that are so important in our lives could be yanked away at any moment.

Making Light: Fckng Ralph Nader, fckng Public Citizen

Archaeology, biology, and history meet under interesting circumstances

Of lice and men: Secret destroyer of Boney's army revealed at last

I'm back, at full speed

although apparently having trouble typing words in any coherency, as I have to keep going back and fixing mistakes.

I'm blogging from home using my new internet connexion through the cable company. Woo-hoo!

Also, I did go ahead and get that tyre yesterday because the one I was replacing became unbalanced and was making the car list to the left and it sounded for all the world as if the tyre were flat and/or about to fall off. So, I moved up my purchase a day. Now it's going rather smoothly.

Well, just a quick note by way of update. I have some errands to run, but now I can blog any time, and I've just checked out my e-mail for job #2 and it gets/sends e-mail fine, which will help when working from home. I'll write soon.