PHAR 778 Drug Literature Evaluation and Patient Drug Education (Spring 2025)

The resources listed below may be useful for communicating health and medication information to patients. Each provides high quality, easy-to-understanding information.

Consumer Health Information Websites

• CDC Health Topics A-Z Index provides health information on popular topics, frequent inquiries, or topics relevant to the CDC’s public health mission. Includes open-access handouts, brochures, videos and more.
• Information for Consumers and Patients | Drugs (FDA) provides information on drug-related trending topics, tips for finding information about drugs, medication safety. Includes print and video content.
• MedlinePlus (National Library of Medicine) provides high-quality, relevant health and wellness information that is easy to understand in both English and Spanish. Below are specific features of MedlinePlus that may be useful for patient education.
  • MedlinePlus (Spanish)
  • Drugs, Herbs and Supplements
  • Evaluating Health Information
  • Understanding Medical Research
• National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health - Health Topics A-Z provides evidence-based fact sheets written for a consumer audience. Fact sheets cover common complementary and integrative health therapies as well as complementary health approaches for common health conditions.

Tools for Pharmacists

• HerbList App from the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health provides research-based information about the safety ad effectiveness of herbal products.
• NatMed provides information on dietary supplements and natural medicines. Features include an interaction checker, effectiveness checker, a database of commercial dietary supplements, as well as information on adverse effects, pregnancy and lactation safety, patient handouts and monographs.
• UpToDate Lexidrug Patient Education provides the capability to print complete patient educational packets with information on medications, conditions, and/or procedures. This information is available in up to 19 languages - all content is in English and Spanish.
• USP Health Literacy: Promoting Safe Medication Use includes health literacy tools for healthcare professionals that promote patient understanding and mitigate medication errors. Includes a library of images to help patients understand how to read and understand medication labels and instructions.