The US Food and Drug Administration reported this week it has been notified that patients are developing a potentially deadly form of pancreatitis while taking the popular diabetes drug Byetta.

The FDA received six new reports. Two of the patients died and four are recovering.

Federal regulators are working with Amylin Pharmaceuticals and Eli Lilly & Co. to develop a stronger warning label for the widely used drug. Regulators stress that patients who exhibit symptoms of pancreatitis should stop taking Byetta right away. Those symptoms include nausea, vomiting and abdominal pain. Regulators warn that it can be very difficult to tell the difference between acute and less dangerous forms of pancreatitis.

This isn’t the first time the FDA has addressed this problem. In October 2007, the FDA issued an alert that about 30 patients developed problems while taking the drug, though none of those patients died.

Earlier this week, a Virginia man filed a defective drug lawsuit in a California court alleging Byetta’s manufacturers failed to adequately test and monitor the side effects, and didn’t warn doctors or patients of the risk of developing pancreatitis.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 20th, 2008 at 7:02 pm and is filed under Blogroll, Defective Drugs, Safety, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.