A New Computer System for Management of Concomitant Drug Use and Medication Regimen for Fluopyrimidine Aniticancer Drugs

The fluoropyrimidine anticancer drugs and antifungal agent, flucytosine, are designed to become active after they are metabolized into 5-fluorouracil in the body. The gimeracil in TS-1®, which consists of tegafur, gimeracil and oteracil, is included to block the catabolization of 5-fluorouracil, but an increase in the concentration of 5-fluorouracil in the body when TS-1 is used in combination with other fluoropyrimidine drugs causes serious blood and bone marrow and gastrointestinal disorders, which can be fatal. Therefore, it is important for pharmacists to check for concomitant drug use from 7 days before starting the administration of TS-1 as well as the entire medication regimen.In our hospital, this used to be done using paper records kept for each patient but with an increase in the quantity of such records, it had become very time-consuming to retrieve the data we needed. There was also the problem of the amount of space needed to store all of these records. As a solution to these problems, we developed a new computer system to keep the records electronically instead of on paper.The new system has enabled us to find patient data easily. It also allows us to rapidly carry out patient registration, check the body surface area, check for any medicines used in 7 days before starting administration of TS-1 and manage medication regimens at the same time as filling prescriptions. It also shortens the time required to input patient data for both existing patients and new patients.