NEW YORK—The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said Thursday that some doctors and pharmacies are getting confused by the similar names of an antidepressant and a blood-thinning medicine.
The FDA says it’s not aware of any patients who took the wrong drug, but the agency says it has received 50 reports of medication errors, including cases where doctors prescribed the wrong drug or pharmacies dispensed the wrong one. The two medications are Brintellix, an antidepressant, and Brilinta, a blood-thinning medication used to treat severe chest pain, prevent death after a heart attack, or prevent a second heart attack.
The agency says it’s been receiving reports of errors since Brintellix was approved in September 2013.
