There is a dramatic rise in deaths from accidental medication mistakes at home in the last two decades, the researchers analyzed the death certificates of the American dead people to prepare that report.

The researchers blamed increasing use of prescription painkillers and other drugs at homes which were mostly used mainly in hospitals 25 years back.According to lead author David P. Phillips of the California University, San Diego, “The amount of responsibility on the patients is on rise and the amount of medical supervision is on decrease”

The findings have been based on almost 50 million death certificates and it will be published in the Archive of Internal Medicine on Monday. The researchers found more than 224,000 cases of fatal medication errors like using prescribed drugs with other street drugs or alcohol and overdoses of these medications.

In 1983 there were 1,132 medication mistakes related deaths in the U.S while in 2004 the number raised to 12,426. Considering population growth, there was an increase of more than 700 percent in that period of time.

Contrarily, only a 5 percent increase in fatal medication errors was found in places away from home like hospitals without involving street drugs or alcohol.

It is not clear how much but the abuse of prescription drugs plays a clear-cut role. The most of deaths occur when valid prescriptions are consumed mistakenly and especially narcotics like methadone and oxycodone cause a large number of deaths, some experts state.

Articles published in CoolHealthTips.com are unique and property of the site only. Copying Content or Publishing Article from CoolHealthTips.com is strictly not allowed and against Site’s policy.