Names Create Medical Confusion

Celebrex, the hot-selling new arthritis pill, sounds a lot like Celexa, a depression treatment, and Cerebyx, an anti-seizure drug.

It’s not just patients who are confused. Since Celebrex was launched in January, federal regulators say they’ve received 95 reports of errors by doctors and pharmacists dispensing the painkiller, problems blamed on health professionals confusing the painkiller with similarly named drugs.

None of the reports involve serious injury or death. But the two companies selling the drugs have recently started trying to clear up the confusion with an educational campaign aimed at physicians and pharmacists.