“#$*%$#^* – it” !

Among the many “freebies” given to doctors by drug companies, I find “post-it” notes particularly handy. I stick ’em on my desk, in my diary, on my computer, on the fridge, on the dashboard . . . everywhere. Life is much more organised for their existence. And they are such innocuous little darlings . . . or are they?

During the past year, I was informed that a young sportswoman hospitalised with severe septic arthritis of the right knee, but otherwise healthy, had been inadvertently prescribed a “novel antipsychotic”. The apparent reason for the error was that the surgical resident, weary at the end of a long shift, had transcribed on to the drug chart the names of the patient’s antibiotics (jotted down on a “post-it”) plus the name of the antipsychotic (advertised by the pharmaceutical company at the top of the “post-it”).