Drug safety of rioprostil in patients with active gastric or duodenal ulcer.

Data from a large number of patients (1918) treated with rioprostil, H2-antagonists and placebo, are analysed to examine the safety profile of rioprostil in the treatment of active gastric ulcer or active duodenal ulcer. Rioprostil is administered to 1000 of those patients. Patients who dropped out of the studies and those with adverse drug reactions are classified and compared within different subgroups. The overall dropout rate for rioprostil patients is 8.8%: 2.3% of these because of adverse reactions. The incidence of adverse reactions during rioprostil treatment is 20.9%, with more than 60% of these having gastrointestinal symptoms, mainly appearing in the first week of therapy. Comparisons show a higher incidence of symptoms with rioprostil treatment than with ranitidine treatment because of the gastrointestinal symptoms. Possible differences are found between groups in sex, age, and drug dose. The analysis of laboratory variables does not show clinically important changes as a result of rioprostil treatment.