Research of the dimentions of off-label drug use in veterinary medicine

Usage of off-label or non-indicational drugs; which is defined as the usage of a drug in ways (different species, different doses, different durations, different ages, different application ways and different cases) that are not written on the prospectus or label. However the current laws in veterinary medicine allow this use but it charges the responsibility on the practitioner and the enforcer. Being legally safe does not eliminate the problem of antimicrobial resistance and food residues that threaten animal and public health. The physician who decides that such an application, should necessarily prepare an off-label drug use request form and a notified patient consent form. The absence of off-indication drug use guide in veterinary medicine, which is published for human physicians, causes veterinarians who apply off label drugs to feel unsafe while performing their profession and leads to the inability to provide a uniformity in the forms. In this study, the off-label drug groups used by 542 veterinarians serving in different geographical regions of Turkey and in different service areas were examined in terms of frequency, quality, way of usage, reason for useage and adverse effects encountered. In the light of the data obtained, it was investigated whether there is a need for an off-label drug use guide in veterinary medicine. More than half of the veterinarians use off label drugs in descending order are antimicrobials, vitamin/mineral preparations, antiparasitics, other drugs and antiseptics-disinfectants. It has been determined that the drugs are used mostly by changing the type and dose, various reasons are given as justification for the choice of drugs and they mostly encounter allergic reactions and digestive system disorders. Consequently, 93,9% of the veterinarians declared that the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry should publish an off-label drug use guideline and 87,3% of them declared that a request form-informed patient consent form should be inclueded in the guideline so it has shown that the publication of the off-label drug use guide is obligation rather than a necessity