United States National Library of Medicine National Institutes of Health

FAQ: US Drug Information

Question: Where can I find information about US drugs?

Answer:

Because we can only direct you to very general information, we encourage you to ask your doctor or pharmacist if you have specific questions.

The NLM Drug Portal is a gateway to current drug information from the National Library of Medicine and other key government agencies. http://druginfo.nlm.nih.gov/drugportal/drugportal.jsp

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration Center for Drug Evaluation and Research(CDER) is the U.S. Agency with expertise to answer some drug information questions. See the CDER Division of Drug Information page at http://www.fda.gov/cder/Offices/DDI/default.htm .

A CDER contact form is at http://www.fda.gov/cder/comment.htm or write to druginfo@fda.hhs.gov

You can use the NLM DIRLINE database at http://dirline.nlm.nih.gov/ to search for other drug information organizations and their services. Some may do research for you to answer your question(s).

More NLM tools to find drug information are:

Drugs, Supplements, and Herbal Information at
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/druginformation.html
Medicines at
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/aboutyourmedicines.html
Over the Counter Medicines at
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/overthecountermedicines.html
Pain Relievers at
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/painrelievers.html
Drug Safety at
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/drugsafety.html
Drug Therapy Health Topics list at
http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/drugtherapy.html
DailyMed provides information about prescription drugs as found in medication package inserts.
http://dailymed.nlm.nih.gov/dailymed/about.cfm
PubMed/MEDLINE or TOXLINE are databases for references to biomedical journal research articles for professionals.

For more information, see the MEDLINE Fact Sheet at http://www.nlm.nih.gov/pubs/factsheets/medline.html
and the TOXLINE Fact Sheet at http://www.nlm.nih.gov/pubs/factsheets/toxlinfs.html

We also suggest you:

Contact your local public, hospital or university library to ask what resources are available to you.
Find information on a drug company's Web site.|
Use an Internet search engine to find other information. For example, the Drug Digest web site includes drug interactions and drug comparisons at http://www.drugdigest.org/DD/Interaction/ChooseDrugs/1,4109,,00.html

The NLM does not approve or guarantee information at other sites.

Related Questions:: Where can I find information about international (non-US) drugs?; How can I identify a pill?

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Last reviewed: 25 August 2008
Last updated: 25 August 2008
First published: 01 January 1999
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