Application of a New "Pharmvigill©" App for the Analysis of Dermatological Adverse Drug Reaction in a Tertiary Care Hospital

Aim: To assess the patterns of dermatological adverse drug reactions (ADRs) and drugs responsible to formulate a strategy for prevention and treatment using a new app. Materials and Methods: In the present study, 870 patients in dermatology outpatient department were screened, out of which sixty cutaneous ADRs were included in the study. The ADRs were categorized and assessed by Causality Assessment Scale and Preventability Scale using an innovative mobile software application named "Pharmvigill (c)-ADR analyzer App." Results: It was observed that rashes and acneiform eruption (25% and 16.7%, respectively) were the most common cutaneous ADRs. Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (25%) were the most common group of drugs causing cutaneous ADRs followed by antimicrobial drugs (23.3%) and steroids (20%). Similarly, betamethasone, paracetamol, and phenytoin were the most common drugs causing ADRs. In the causality assessment, almost 81% fell into the category of "probable," whereas 58.8% of the ADRs were "probably preventable" and almost 40% were "not preventable." There was no statistically significant difference (P > 0.05) between scores in manual assessment and software-based assessment. Conclusion: Cutaneous ADRs are caused by some of the very commonly prescribed medicines. A high degree of suspicion is required to identify the "preventable" type of ADR. The ADR analysis app "Pharmvigill" is accurate and can decrease the analysis time of the ADRs in a dynamic clinical scenario.