Are TV Pharmaceutical Ads Damaging? 383
trivialscene asks: "ABC News is carrying an article about a recently published study in the medical research journal Annals of Family Medicine which examined prime time television ads run by pharmaceutical companies. The researchers concluded that the generally ambiguous ads, which appeal almost entirely to emotion rather than fact, tend to confuse viewers. They also suggest that the ads may be creating problems at the doctor's office, as some people might become convinced they need a particular medication and insist on getting it, rather than leaving the decision to trained medical professionals. What do you think about the presence of drug advertisements on television?"
not sure (Score:5, Funny)
The way I see it... (Score:5, Insightful)
I know this because I am friends with a general practitioner (been an MD for about 15 years now) and he tells me that people in shape, like the actors in the commercials - in general - don't get heartburn.
I also know this because I was one of those people that got heartburn regularly. Once I started eating properly and getting back in shape, my heartburn disappeared.
Re:The way I see it... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:The way I see it... (Score:4, Insightful)
This is what all ads do. And yes, ads are damaging. All of them.
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Yes, I think it is safe to say that drug ads are not a good thing. There are a number of people who take a lot of heed in what is advertised to them. And then they feel that the drugs are something they need. Another thing it does is take away from generics, which, IMHO, are a fantastic alternative to name brand drugs - due to their price. I would say that there are a number of people who don't have a lot of means that are swayed to take Claratin ov
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I was on daily heartburn medication when I went on a low-carb diet. Haven't used it since. Apparently there were two things at work - the kinds of carbs I was eating spurred acid production, and the fats I was eating more of are harder to digest, so the acid being produced is being used for what it was supposed to be used for: digestion.
Now, I did lose a lot of weight, but the acid reflux disappeared within days after starting.
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Re:The way I see it... (Score:4, Insightful)
glass of red wine with dinner = heartburn
tomato sauce on pasta (or any tomato products) = heartburn
hamburger = heartburn
not eating at the correct times = sometimes heartburn (haven't figured this out)
If I eat enough milk fats with any of the above, I dont't get heartburn. Hence, I mix tomato sauce with a little Alfredo sauce, put cheese on the burger and have a glass of milk, and I don't have a problem.
Incidentally, this runs in the familiy. My father is on daily prescription medication and needs the valve at the top of his stomach replaced at some point. My older sister now takes daily over-the-counter medication and is still having problems. Both, like me, are generally in shape. My dad's suffered from it for most of his life, and I've been dealing with it since I was 20 or so.
Who cares? (Score:5, Funny)
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=Smidge=
Re:Who cares? (Score:5, Funny)
All that matters is that there are pills that give me erections for hours on end.
You need pills for that? Sheesh, what's this country coming to?
marketing vs R&D (Score:5, Insightful)
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Once they get on the market, they're only heavily advertised for a year or so.
The ads are also aimed less at the consumer and more at doctors; doctors are the ones that have to prescribe it, after all, so they have to learn about it before patients start asking about it. Otherwise the patients will think the doctor is uni
Re:marketing vs R&D (Score:5, Informative)
Actually, it's entirely true. Take a look at the financials of your average pharmaceutical. They spend less than 20% of revenue on R&D, 40% is marketing and administration, and 40% cost of production and distribution. Some have profits that are twice what they spend on R&D.
That, of course, means we'd get five times the R&D for the same money we're paying today if we paid for it outright rather than granting monopolies. Or we'd get the same level of R&D at a fifth of the price.
Mod Parent Up (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:marketing vs R&D (Score:4, Insightful)
While it is true that each pharma company holds a monopoly on the drugs it invents, pharma is in no way a monopolized industry. If dumping money into R&D were so effective another pharma company with the same outrageous profits could do 5x more research, relying solely on academic journals to spread the word, and clean up with their vastly more and superior drugs. Unfortunately, pharma doesn't think (maybe rightly so) that an investment in R&D translates 1:1 into profit. Where, on the other hand, they seem to think (probably erroneously) that an investment in advertising translates more effectively into revenue.
Personally, I think that the solution involves regulating what, when, and how pharma can advertise, and severely regulating the way pharma's sales reps interact with doctors. But hey, as long as they can afford the good lobbiests, none of this will happen, so maybe we really ought to start with some decent lobbying reform.
Re:marketing vs R&D (Score:4, Informative)
For example looking under Pfizer's recent released financials you will see they spent 7,599 and 835 on R&D costs (clearly stated) while spending 15,589 on SG&A. Assuming SG&A all goes to marketing, which is incorrect, you would get a good 32% on marketing and 17% on R&D. However as stated SG&A is not just marketing. If you could figure out what percentage of SG&A is marketing then you would be correct.
If I recall correctly congress was going to pass a bill which would of required pharmaceutical companies to report the true percentage spent on marketing but due to lobbying it was shot down.
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Uninterested doctors who got into medicine for the wrong reasons are a big problem with medicine in my opinion. I'm right there with you on researching drugs and medical conditions on your own, too. I don't recommend being uninvolved in your own health.
But TV commercials, as far as I can tell, don't really contribute any helpful in
Re:marketing vs R&D (Score:4, Funny)
Oh of COURSE that's what it means.
Maybe they need that marketing to sell the drugs to pay for the R&D to make the drugs and the best way to do that is to pay for more advertisements.
You think companies like to advertise? They would rather give the money to R&D if the drugs actually sold themselves. Most drugs, however, do not sell themselves. Most of the medication sold in this country has little effect or could easily be replaced by an older drug which is 1/10 the cost and only 3 to 4% less effective.
Another problem is that if the patient dies, that '3 to 4%' figure is brought up in COURT in the form of a malpractice suit against the doctor that prescribed the alternative!
The niche medications which treat ailments that effect 1% of the population have a high price and the research in finding them is often NEVER PAID OFF. It's a tightly held secret that drug companies often pursue avenues that yield JACK SQUAT.
The worthless 'celebrex' and 'nexium' medications pay for those dead ends and niche drugs. And their marketing allows them to do that.
Drugs like Celebrex which show barely any improvement over placebo, and medications that take care of problems related to obesity (a relatively easily-cured disease) wouldn't be flying off the counters if it weren't for those commercials.
If the drug companies cut their marketing in half, freeing up 20% of their revenue according to your figures (which, btw, are wrong), they may end up having half the revenue to work with. So they'd have -50% less money and +20% more, for a net of -30%. Those are obviously arbitrary figures, but you can see the point: less marketing does not mean more money for R&D.
So, to sum up, the pharmaceutical system in the US is the best money could buy. If central planning were the answer, the US wouldn't be lapping the socialized world in pharmacological research. When government starts telling doctors what to prescribe and price fixing on drugs in America, we'll see a quick restructuring inside these companies in which R&D will fall through the floor.
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Actually what you have done is prove that the US pharma system is about the WORST that money can buy.
Pushing placebos and snake oil on an uneducated public is NOT the right way to fund R&D.
Even if most R&D in breakthrough drugs was funded privately, which it is NOT. Most private R&D is in copycat drugs which provide little or no medical benefit over existing drugs and are pursued as a way to bust through the mono
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First, riddle me this: When's the last time you saw an ugly rep? Most of those salesfolk we saw were women, cuties, 20s-30s. They brought the doctor and staff free lunch from the nearest Olive Garden or the like, and just sat around and shot the bull for the first half of lunch. Alway complimentary and a
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That's because drug companies actively recruit cheerleaders [nytimes.com] to work as reps.
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Good thing the AMA restricts the supply of doctors. What would we do without it?
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I tried this. Added bonuses were that I tried out and made second soprano in the Vienna Boys' Choir (at age 46), I don't have to shave any more, and my underwear doesn't fit as tightly either.
One downside was that my nipples are a lot more sensitive than they used to be.
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In the insurance industry it is widely accepted that the commericals actually do more harm to the cost of prescription drugs. If you had never heard of Viagra but were instead given the generic, you wouldn't have a care in the world. Both have the same result,
Re:marketing vs R&D (Score:4, Informative)
Hate to break it to you, but the ads ARE in fact aimed at the consumers. They are telling YOU to ask your doctor. You the consumer. And lucky for them there are millions of mild hypocondriacts out there that go running to their doctor the first chance they get to get a script. And for the most part the doctors ARE uninformed about the drugs they are perscribing. Pharmacists are the ones that actually have to learn about the drugs and try to catch as many dangerous interactions the doctors may or may not know about as they can. There are a whole lot of doctors out there that happilly collect the office visit fee, write the script, and then wait to collect again when their patient comes back complaining about the side effects from the dangerous medication they are taking (and didn't really need in the first place). Its a vicious cycle that is the #1 biggest reason health care is so "expensive" in the US these days (followed by the #2 reason: rapent medical malpractice settlements, most of which are kept off the public records).
Viagra is a perfect example of a drug completely out of control. How "nessasary" is it for most of the millions who are taking it? How dangerous is it? How easilly can just about anybody email a less then completely ethical doctor somewhere and have a script mailed to them? Lets run down the possible side effects:
flushing, headache, nasal congestion, stomach discomfort following meals, abnormal vision including blurred vision, seeing shades of colors differently than before, or sensitivity to light, bladder pain, cloudy or bloody urine, dizziness, increased frequency of urination, pain on urination, diarrhea, bleeding of the eye, convulsions (seizures), decreased or double vision or other changes in vision, prolonged, painful, or inappropriate erection of penis, redness, burning, or swelling of the eye, anxiety
at least this one has relatively "mild" side effects compared to some other drugs. I have seen heartburn medication that had a possible side effect listed of "Death"...no joke. Guess they figure if you die you won't have that heartburn any more and it's a win for them.
If laws exist to keep cigarettes and alcohol from being advertized to minors, shouldn't stuff that has been shown to cause even more prompt death or permanent damage be more tightly regulated in who it's pushed on?
I was a pharmacist's assistant.
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I think the big wake up call should be the fact that Big Pharma is spending more on marketing their drugs than on developing them in the first place.
Well, thankfully here in the UK they are banned from advertising perscription medication to the public; they have to do that to the doctors, afterall it's a doctors job to know what drug I need, I can then go and research it but at least it doesn't encourage hypocondria.
Over the counter medicines, however are advertised here with as much vigour as anywhere else, so all those cough and cold remidies that are basically just paracetamol each get their own advert.
Re:marketing vs R&D (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:marketing vs R&D (Score:5, Interesting)
If I can explain something in 2 minutes rather than spend 5 minutes ordering a drug or test, everyone wins. Of course, this does not always happen, and sometimes the picture is less than clear when I leave a room...but a little extra time spent talking seems to save a lot of time in the end.
Take, for example, the common scenario of the vomiting child. Parents worried, me busy...now I can simply say, "yup, your child is vomiting, we'll give some *insert expensive anti-vomiting medication* and an IV," or I can spend a few minutes explaining the WHO process of giving small amounts (1 tsp or so) of fluid every few minutes so that the child will not vomit, explain how to limit the diet a bit for the next couple of days, and let the parents ask a few questions. In the end, the medication and IV takes an hour+ to accomplish, or the parents spend 1/2 hour giving small amounts of fluid that add up quickly. Either way (usually) the child's mild dehydration gets treated...and with a little more talking up front, I save 1/2 hour down the line.
I am the first to admit physicians get lulled into a "drug for every disease" pattern, but the truth is, a little time, reassurance and education will solve the majority of problems. The trick is knowing which problems that approach won't solve...but that's why I went to med school in the first place (and a topic for another day).
If not outright damaging, they don't help (Score:5, Insightful)
If the drug companies want me to sell my doctor on their particlar product, I should get a commission every time they write me the prescription.
Ask your doctor about modding parent up. (Score:5, Insightful)
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They listen less. (Score:2)
I'm not sure ignoring patients' comments necessarily makes a good doctor. I'm sure there are a lot of idiots saying dumb shit to their doctors. And I don't blame doctors for just gradually filtering out that stuff and ignoring what the patients have to say. But I don't know if it's good.
In the times I've dealt with doctors I've come to realize that the vast majority of them are not interested in listening to your self-diagnosis. And we probably have idiotic patients brainwashed by advertising to thank for
The doctors arn't the whole problem. (Score:2)
If patients are spending their own money on drugs they don't need, no biggie. But when they use their insurance to pay for drugs they don't need, everyone ends up paying more for insurance.
This doesn't need to be solved by the government. Insurance companies just need to reduce or eliminate thei
Re:Ask your doctor about modding parent up. (Score:5, Funny)
You're seeing Dr. House?
Re:If not outright damaging, they don't help (Score:4, Insightful)
Actually, both of you have a job (though you're totally correct that yours isn't to act as a drug sales rep). What's insidious about this kind of advertising is that it exploits what should be a good trend. The old model of "doctor knows best, do whatever he tells you" isn't ideal. The best case scenario is when a patient becomes informed about his/her health and makes decisions in consultation with the doctor, drawing on the doctor's expertise.
When I was seriously ill a few years back, my doctors (who were outstanding btw) encouraged me to do research on my own. I scoured medical databases and brought that info to my doctors, who helped me sort through it. I think it elevated the quality of my care, and it made me feel like I retained some control over a scary illness.
Unfortunately, by feeding patients information that is biased or misleading and playing to emotion rather than providing useful information, these ads are probably eroding the kind of doctor-patient relationships that everyone should have.
YES (Score:5, Informative)
My mom's an MA (medical assistant) and my wife is a medical student (M2), and both tell me that those ads are a problem.
I hate hearing about people demanding drugs after seeming them on TV, thinking they know better than a professional with 4+ years of training. I watched my wife study for her pharm course, and all the interactions, contraindications, etc is enough to make her head spin a little bit (and mine a lot). Also, most of the time an off-patent generic drug that's been around for years is more beneficial than those new drugs being advertised.
It's the like the old joke about the old lady who wants that new arthritis drug: Viagra.
What do I think? (Score:2)
Seriously, if they want untrained lemming to make the decision on use, rather than trained professionals, then I suspect the product is not good quality. And the commercials, as stated, target the untrained and unknowing, not the doctors and professionals
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Until Viagra was heavily advertized most men would never admit that they ever had problems obtaining an erection even to their doctor, after the advertizements I'm certain that way more men feel comfortable talking about impotence with their doctors and finding out what treatment is available.
The problems I have with drug advertizing is that, like all marketing, they often prey on the fact that people are generally not satisfied with their life; the
Yes (Score:5, Insightful)
doctors aren't up on drugs, though (Score:2)
Doctors are often overwhelmed by the huge number of potential drugs. Most tend to settle into the 1 or 2 they typically prescribe for a given condition, rather than knowin
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Noticed in your sig you like Bill Hicks (Score:4, Interesting)
What exactly does a "pharmaceutical consulting group" do, anyway? Something good, like "Facilitate open communication between drug companies and doctors?" Or something bad like "Figure out how to push more drugs whether people need them or not?"
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For those not in the know:
PAP (patient assistance programs) basically means say you are 70 and your only income is social security. You need this injectable drug for the arthritis in your knees. Well, say you cannot afford your copayment. We will either A. Convince the insurance company to lower your copayment. B. Reimburse you in full for the copayment. Or C. Give you the drug for fr
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As an industry insider, do you have any thoughts on the best way to handle health care? Do you think
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WRONG! (Score:3, Insightful)
Two, doctors don't know all of the existing drugs before they graduated from medical school, did their residency, etc. They don't have full knowledge of the thousands of drugs that were out there, they were too
WRONG==you. You're missing the point, troll. (Score:3, Informative)
1. New drugs do indeed come out all t
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And if a trip to Bermuda causes m
I think they're great (Score:2)
Your doctor doesn't know what you're interested unless you ask. And unless you see an ad you might not know something even exists to ask about. Sure, some people might ask about things they don't need, but that's a lot less troubling than people not asking for something t
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Breaking News! (Score:2)
They also suggest that the ads may be creating problems at the doctor's office, as some people might become convinced they need a particular medication and insist on getting it, rather than leaving the decision to trained medical professionals
Breaking News! The earth has a rich supply of dummies! Most people's so-called thought processes are made up of a patchwork of what their dysfunctional parents thought, what their nee'r do well friends think, what the TV shows thrust upo
RLS (Score:2)
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Social Action (Score:2)
But I would support a social movement to make them socially unacceptable. In general, I don't see ads for products that you are literally incapable of safely determining if you need them as a good thing in a world where half the population has below-median IQ.
Ultimately, t
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You know, it really bugs me that doctors don't already automatically prescribe generics. Most insurance companies I've been on require that the pharmacy substitute a generic if available. Further, they have a relatively short list of name brand medications that they'll ful
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The free speech implications of this don't bother you?
Or, more likely, there's some more logical premises that you believe in that you aren't expressing here. Care to try to explicitly express them?
Not for me (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Not for me (Score:5, Funny)
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Bad Idea (Score:5, Insightful)
I also thing as a society we are treating symptoms by developing dependencies on medication rather than fixing problems.
If drug companies can afford every other Super Bowl commercial, and drug reps can throw money at every doctor and pharmacist in the country, maybe they can afford to sell drugs at reasonable prices to third world countries.
George W. Bush (love him or hate him, who am I kidding, everyone hates him) maybe did one thing right. He found American drug companies were charging five times as much for AIDS medications in Africa as they charged here. They openly profitted from people's deaths, and played upon their fears.
And yes, I believe their ads play upon emotions. I'd like to see a ban on drug ads on TV. They can spend the money in better places, like further drug research or third world countries.
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Bush told the drug companies that if they didn't lower the cost of AIDS medicine in Africa, he would forbid those companies from selling out of the country period and allow someone else to take over that market. He also fought drug companies to lower costs of prescriptions for senior citizens.
Not even Bush likes drug companies.
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Doctors talk out of their asses all the time. Let me give some examples:
I broke a finger many years ago. Pretty quickly it was obvious that it wasn't quite pointing in quite the right direction. "Your finger will point the right way when the swelling goes down". It was completely obvious to me that there was no way that a bit of swelling could have been pushing half my finger in the wrong direction. 3 months later I'm told
why else would they advertise if not to sell it? (Score:2)
Of course that's why they're advertising the medication! We can't honestly believe that those ads are only for doctors when they air to a national audience. I really disagree with the viagra/etc ads because they glamorize being on a prescription drug for pleasure and not to cure some disease (i.e. ED).
They are banned in Britain (Score:4, Interesting)
Our medical system is based on the principle that if for have something wrong with you, you see a doctor, and the doctor prescribes the right drug for it if one exists. Therefore, drug companies market to doctors, not to patients, which seems the most sensible way to do it - after all a drug company's spend on advertising is spread a lot less thinly if they only advertise to doctors.
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This is the fundamental reason why our medical system fails it. While drugs have their place, they usually aren't the best response to an illness. But, in Fascist America (de facto integration between corporations and the government), all the health options that are NOT drugs or surgery get labeled 'alternative', and you generally have to dis
Doctors get Pharmcked too (Score:2)
He was very happy to do it because he was sick of the drug m
This parody says it all (Score:2)
"Panexa: ask your doctor for a reason to take it"
Leaving the decision (Score:2)
Calling this a "problem" is entirely indicative of our totally flawed and failing (if not failed) health care system. The pure arrogance is astounding.
Make all the available information public, and let us decide. If we want your opinion, o great and revered medical professional, we'll ask. But we don't need or want this profession's nanny-s
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Yes, it was my decision, and I should be held fully responsible for the outcome, not the doctor. Society already has well-established rules and penalty systems in place to handle this. Don't protect me from myself, thank you very much. We're far too quick to
Probably damaging (Score:2)
This is incredibly damaging. You know there's going to be some dock worker in New Jersey who desperately needs Plavix who's going to say "Oh yeah? Some fuckin' clot gets in my body I'll whoop its ass!" It's like a dare.
I wonder how many badasses are going to have to die before they pull this campaign.
Actually a Big Problem (Score:2)
If you've ever watched "House" when Dr. House is in the clinic and people are always t
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Ads are ads (Score:2)
They're a waste of my time (Score:2)
Bankrupting the company (Score:2)
Yes and No (Score:2)
No, because hospitals are more dangerous to your health than any drug ad. So what if people think they need something, if they don't trust their doctor they should get a new one.
Maybe (Score:2)
There is a huge ethical debate within the Healthcare community on Medication Advertising. On one hand, some people might not know that options beyond what the doctor is suggesting exists. This fact makes Medication Advertising an additional component to Informed Consent, an important concept within Healthcare in the USA. On the other hand, every female hypochondriac might be going, "I think I am suffering from ED."
It does cause Patients to push doctors into subscribing medicine. I am not sure that is any b
In Canada, it's on purpose (Score:2)
In Canada... (Score:2)
1. Explain what the drug does, WITHOUT saying its name.
2. Say the drugs name, but don't explain what it does.
Hence the reason why our Viagra ads have some guy bouncing (jumping) in a very stiff standing position down a street with a huge smile on his face, then it says: "VIAGRA" at the end.
The problem is... (Score:2)
In the US it seems pefectly acceptable that normal people are on at least one presription at any one time, which is ridiculous. I'm amazed by the amount of perscriptions the average person (i.e. my frinds) have i
Depends on the quality of the doctor (Score:2)
I'm the ex-wife of a doctor, and I can tell you the inside story about this.
The truth value of the above quote depends very much on what is meant by 'trained'. If your doctor's training occurred thirty years ago, and if he or she doesn't keep up with the latest re
Used to work in this industry. (Score:5, Interesting)
The entire purpose of pharmaceutical sales at the doctor, clinic and hospital administration level is this: To abnormally influence the prescribing of drugs beyond what information is public by way of peer-reviewed scientific research. The drugs your doctors prescribe are sometimes influenced by how many pens, pads, lunches, dinners and other free crap are given to the physician and/or his staff. The drugs your insurance company covers are most influenced by what pharmaceutical company wines and dines the formulary administrators the most.
Physicians and administrators who participate in golf junkets, etc., are just as much to blame, but that doesn't remove the culpability of the pharmaceutical companies who know exactly what they're doing and are constantly pushing to be able to intrude even more in the treatment of a patient by way of these methods.
There are examples of egregious behavior at various levels of the pharmaceutical business ranging from minor nuisances to egregious breaches of ethics. One competing company's rep, while I was covering Mayo Clinic, got his company kicked out for six months by following a physician into his office WHILE the physician was seeing a patient... What was the rep's urgent matter? To deliver his canned sales pitch for his product. There have been pharmaceutical companies nailed for including large gifts in honorariums given to physicians for speaking on behalf of their products.
Mayo Clinic is one of the few institutions that has extremely strict rules... No pens, no pads, no papers, samples are signed in through a controlled process giving the rep very limited access to physicians. At the same time, they'll gladly throw up a banner for your product if you'll give them a huge research grant... While that's no guarantee that they'll bias the research in the pharma company's favor, human nature is such that money tends to drive a sense of obligation to the benefactor.
The advertisements have taken the Creationist approach to marketing... by appealing to the opinions and attitudes of the average, uninformed layperson. In doing so, they are still interfering in the process without really contributing anything of value that cannot be obtained by a physician who keeps up by reading the peer-reviewed journals on his or her own time... as a good physician will want to do. Physicians already have a motivation to do this research... it's called avoiding malpractice lawsuits.
Previously reputable pharmaceutical companies have stepped up and started direct advertising to consumers on television... It's getting worse and the cacophony of products being advertised by these companies creates a confusing atmosphere of insufficient information that does what exactly? The commercials don't begin by encouraging patients experiencing certain symptoms to go see their doctor and let them do their educated diagnoses. The ads begin by summarizing symptoms in a manner that creates a sort of confirmation bias, i.e. rattling off a barrage of symptoms, one of which might lead the viewer to suspect they need the drug... while ignoring the specific COMBINATION of symptoms that preclude a specific diagnosis. Then the ads encourage the patient who SUSPECTS they might have this problem not to go to the doctor and find out the proper course of treatment... but to "ask your doctor for".
They know what they're doing and even though I agree, simultaneously, in the principle of customer awareness... The ignorance of the average customer does not change the fact that it was the intention of the company to defraud and profit on the basis of that ignorance and therefore does not make the company any less responsible for doing so.
While I agree that medical science is a luxury and not a public utility, the health of a country's citizens does directly impact the nation's
It's worse than you think... (Score:5, Informative)
"...according to a review published in the Jan. 19, 2000, Journal of the American Medical Association. Ashley Wazana, M.D., of McGill University, analyzed 29 studies of relations between doctors and the pharmaceutical industry and found that the industry's marketing efforts clearly influence doctors' prescribing habits, although most doctors do not believe this to be true."
Yes (Score:2)
Between the television ads and the constant payola the pharmaceutical companies are giving to the doctors, you are lucky to get a perscription drug that has a generic. Too many morons demand what they saw during Oprah, and the crooked doctors are more than happy to assume that you are one of them.
The ads should be banned, but more importantly the pharmaceutical industry needs some good old-fashioned regulation.
Advertising and the cost of drugs (Score:3, Interesting)
But back to the subject of this comment: If they're spending more money advertising a pill than developing it, we're paying for them to advertise drugs to us that either we need because a doctor knows we do, or that we want because a commercial told us we do. I mean, what the hell is restless leg syndrome? OH MY GOD! I HAVE A SYNDROME!
Pharmaceutical companies, and medicine in general, have a rather special ability to jack up their prices almost at will. The industry is a complex controlled by a small handful of players who dan defy market economics and hand us a single proposition: "If you don't buy our services, you'll die." This isn't like the food industry, although ADM, "the supermarket to the world," is trying to make it happen. If caviar is through the roof, I'll do without. If the price of asparagus doubles, I'll buy string beans instead. But if my heart medicine is too expensive, I buy it or I fucking die.
And they're engaged in unnecessary activities, that dramatically increase costs, by marketing drugs to unqualified decision makers.
More Nanny State Crapola (Score:2)
The FDA wants to control the flow of information to us, because we
cannot be trusted to make decisions for ourselves.
Only two countires in the world... (Score:3, Interesting)
In my view, there can't be ANY advertising which is less helpful than the pushing of prescription medicines on TV. I'd rather see our local prostitutes get air time.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
If they say what the drug does, they also have to say what the side-effects are.
Re:I hate ambiguous drug ads. (Score:4, Informative)
From this page: [amsa.org]
"According to these FDA regulations, advertisers who name a prescription drug, and state its purpose and benefits, must also include full disclosure of its side effects, contraindications, and must follow specific labeling guidelines."
By stating the purpose of the drug, that "extra 5 seconds" suddenly turns into a full minute or two of small print being read to you. Not exactly what the advertisers want to be doing with their time/money.
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By stating the purpose of the drug, that "extra 5 seconds" suddenly turns into a full minute or two of small print being read to you. Not exactly what the advertisers want to be doing with their time/money.
Well the ad would be completely useless if they didn't name the drug, o
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
My roommate at the time and I used to talk about wanting to see a "Propecia Baby".
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Zaxor [angryflower.com] on Bob the Angry Flower
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:I hate ambiguous drug ads. (Score:4, Informative)
And the second reason may seem shitty from a consumers point of view, but from the industrie's point of view it makes sense: it causes you to go online and check out what it does. In the meantime, you get to see what else the company manufactures, and therefore you have more names that are associated with that company and the marketers hope that because you remember another name from their company, if the need to use the treatment that drug provides you are (again, they hope) more likely to use THEIR drug since it's a name you recognize. (Apologies for the run on sentence)
And yes I work in the pharmaceutical industry.
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Hey Doc,
"Is Levitra right for me?"
"Could I benefit from a prescription of Nexium?"
"Which Robitussin should I take?"
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So are patients (Score:2)
Yes, because we all know that not prescribing a useless medication is a good sign of malpractice....
I'm not a doctor, but a computer tech. I've had any number of people who insisted the *knew* what was wrong with their computer (relatives are particularly bad), for example insisting that their network card is broken because a particular webpage shows up. How about the masses that install "Toolbar X" because it c