Expert Available to Discuss Potential New FDA Restrictions on Painkillers

Dr. Steven M. Marcus, executive director of the New Jersey Poison Information & Education System (NJPIES) at UMDNJ-New Jersey Medical School, is available to provide comment on the recommendation by a federal advisory panel that the Food and Drug Administration ban the prescription painkillers Percocet and Vicodin, and reduce the dosage of over-the-counter medications that contain acetaminophen because of their effects on the liver.

Marcus applauds the recommendation by the advisory panel, taking special note of the fact that high doses of acetaminophen are a leading cause of liver damage, and that consumers can easily overdose by taking more than one product that contains acetaminophen.

Marcus established NJ PIES, the state’s poison control center. He is a professor in the Department of Preventive Medicine and Community Health and associate professor of pediatrics at the UMDNJ-New Jersey Medical School.

The University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) is the nation’s largest free-standing public health sciences university with more than 5,500 students attending the state’s three medical schools, its only dental school, a graduate school of biomedical sciences, a school of health related professions, a school of nursing and its only school of public health, on five campuses. Annually, there are more than two million patient visits at UMDNJ facilities and faculty practices at campuses in Newark, New Brunswick/Piscataway, Scotch Plains, Camden and Stratford. UMDNJ operates University Hospital, a Level I Trauma Center in Newark, and University Behavioral HealthCare, a mental health and addiction services network.

Source: University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ)