Naming Convention Biosimilars

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Amaris Fuentes
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Naming Convention Biosimilars

Good afternoon -

As our institution adopts the use of more biosimilar products, the question came up of the appropriate naming convention in the EHR and other places and evaluating possible safety impacts/look-alike, sound-alike risks.

For example, when considering Epoetin alfa (Procrit) vs. Epoetin alfa (Retacrit), is more appropriate to simplify the name or use it's full name of epoetin alfa-epbx (Retacrit)? Our initial thoughts are to use the full name convention with the branded name. Appreciate if anyone has any additional insight or experience with possible medication errors with these drugs.

Thanks