SignalDetDDI: An SAS macro for detecting adverse drug-drug interactions in spontaneous reporting systems.

Abstract

Statistical methods for detecting adverse drug reactions (ADRs) resulting from drug-drug interactions (DDIs) have been used in recent years to analyze the datasets in spontaneous reporting systems. We provide the SignalDetDDI macro in SAS to calculate the criteria for detecting ADRs resulting from the concomitant use of two drugs. We outline two criteria for detecting DDIs with the combination of two drugs and illustrate the implementation of the macro by way of an example. To implement the macro, a user specifies the target ADR and the two drugs to be evaluated. The SignalDetDDI macro outputs a table showing the number of reports on ADRs, the values of the two criteria for detecting ADRs, and the presence of DDIs. This macro enables users to easily and automatically assess the clinical DDIs that result from ADRs. The SignalDetDDI macro is freely available in the Supporting Information.